Latura of Redwall, Book I: A Pageant, Festive and Myriad
by Highwing
Summary: An unexpected new figure emerges in the wake of the Accord between Lord Urthblood and King Tratton. The third Urthblood novel after "The Crimson Badger" and "The Shrew War."
1. Prologue

**PROLOGUE**

Latura simply knew things.

From her earliest seasons, the young ratmaid had perceived the world around her differently from other creatures. Things hidden to most revealed themselves to her with ease. How cold would the coming winter be, how dry the next summer, how severe the impending storm? How long before a certain bit of food was no longer safe to eat? Who would survive this latest outbreak of fever, and who would perish? Would an expecting ratwife bear a male or female, and would the babe be healthy?

Some in her tiny, unnamed village thought Latura a witch, shunning her as they would a pestilence. Many whispered that she could tell whether a creature was speaking truly or false just by listening to their voice or gazing into their eyes. Some even imagined she could read minds, divine the deepest secret yearnings buried in the living heart and decipher the most fleeting of wishes and dreams ... and nightmares.

How much of this might have been true, not even Latura herself could have said. For just as the obscure often seemed plainly apparent to her, so did the obvious frustrate and perplex her. Everybeast of her acquaintance regarded her as simple and slow, unable sometimes to even recognize the faces or summon the names of fellow villagers she'd known all her life. If she was tolerated, it was not only because of the special gifts her kinsfolk and neighbors sometimes called upon for their benefit. Why expend ire and energy toward so sad and pathetic a creature as she?

Lately, however, Latura had been plagued by portents unlike any she'd ever known before. Vaguer than visions but ominous as any omen, these dire phantoms from her waking dreams filled her with a disquiet utterly strange to her. She could not have begun to explain them to anybeast else; indeed, how could she, when she failed to comprehend their meaning herself?

_Red Abbey._

_Red tower._

_Red badger._

_Red foxes._

_Red squirrels._

Everywhere in her fragmented thoughts, the same color. Something was going to happen, was already happening, but the shape of events remained clouded, presenting themselves to her in a jumble of scattered, isolated images rather than a straight, orderly, forward-moving flow.

Latura saw disaster, but knew not its name.

A crunching of pawsteps in the late-winter snowcrust, scarcely louder than the distant rumble of the Eastern Sea crashing against the base of the cliffs below their settlement, made the ratmaid prick up her ears. Gathering her threadbare shawl more tightly about her, scant protection against the chills from both without and within, Latura glanced over her shoulder at the approaching figure.

Patreese came to stand alongside his daughter, planting his footpaws where a patch of hard, bare earth showed through the snow. Latura regarded him in the early forest twilight with an absent and unfocused gaze, as if trying to fasten on him and make him real with her eyes. Then her concentration seemed to crystalize.

"Hullo, Da."

Patreese favored her with a wan smile. "Ah, good. Y' reckergnize me."

"Course I do. I'll always know you, Da."

"Course you will," Patreese said, although something in his tone hinted that he might not have entirely believed his own reassurance. "It's gettin' late, Lattie. Why're you out here? Come back home, 'fore you catch a chill."

Too late fer that, Latura laughed from somewhere deep inside her. "Da, we gotta go."

"Well, ain't that what I jus' said?"

"No, I don't mean that." She looked past him, back toward the ramshackle collection of patchwork mud-and-thatch huts. "I mean this place. We gotta leave th' village."

"Leave th' village? Why would we go an' do that? Where'd we find a better place fer ourselves than 'ere? High atop a sea cliff, protected from raiders 'n' corsairs, with th' forest at our backs to forage from - why, it's th' best homestead a rat could hope fer!" Patreese pointedly omitted how sparse that forest foraging could be, how bitter the winters when the frigid breezes gusted in from the gray seas to scour their clifftop settlement, or that their occasional fishing excursions typically netted little, and more than once had claimed the life of a fellow villager unaccustomed to the ways of wave and tide. Yes, life here could be harsh ... but for vermin like them, it could be even harsher elsewhere.

"We gotta go, Da. Not safe t' stay."

Patreese narrowed his eyes toward Latura. "You seen somethin', didn'tcha? What'd ya see, Lattie?"

"Forest ... it's gonna turn red. It all turns red."

The older rat stared at his daughter, uncomprehending. "Why, sure it'll turn red. Allers does, come autumn. But that's over two seasons from now."

"Not that kinda red. Not th' leaves. Th' forest. Th' whole world."

"Lattie, y' ain't makin' sense."

"I know. But I know what I seen. An' we hafta go 'way."

The determined finality in her voice struck Patreese as Latura's oft-prophetic pronouncements seldom had before. He knew she was serious, and to ignore or dismiss her warning would be folly. "Well then, here's what we'll do. We'll call a village council t' discuss this. An' mebbe wait 'til spring, if we do decide t' leave, when th' travellin's easier. There's still snow on th' ground, in case y' ain't a noterced. In fact, ye're standin' in some right now."

Latura glanced down, as if she'd forgotten her feet were attached to the rest of her. "Oh. No wonder my footpaws're cold. My tail too. But we can't wait, Da. If we wait 'til spring, we won't make it in time."

"Um, make it where?"

"An' if we wait fer summer, they'll already be here."

"Uh, who'll be here?"

"An' if we wait fer fall, this village won't be here no more."

"Now ye're scarin' me, Lattie."

"Good. It's a time fer bein' scared."

"But, what's gonna happen? War, pestilence, fire? What could be so bad that it'll wipe out th' whole village?"

Latura stared at the forest, at the woodscape of bare limbs receding into the gloaming like a frozen frenzy of tangled talons, or a tableau of arms thrown up in desperation to ward off the encroaching evil.

_Red Abbey._

_Red tower._

_Red badger._

_Red foxes._

_Red squirrels._

Latura shuddered at the enormity of the spectral phantoms crowding her mind, at the all-encompassing scope of this nameless, formless destiny about to sweep down upon the only home she'd ever known.

_The red whirlwind._

"We gotta leave," she repeated, "Tomorrow, or next day. No later'n that."

"Where'll we go?"

After a long pause, she replied, "North, an' west. Inta th' heart o' Mossflower."

"That's it?" Patreese demanded, not with ire or impatience but with the resigned and tremulous tones of the misgivings her words had instilled in him. "Just north an' west, inta th' thick o' th' forest?"

"It'll be safe there, Da."

"Safe where? Lattie, I can't breathe one word o' this to anybeast else in th' village, or they'll think me daft. We can't evacuate ev'ry rat here on th' say so of wisps o' dreams. Not even yers."

"If I told you, it wouldn't make any sense, 'cos I don't even know what it means my own self."

"Well , tell me what y' can."

Latura inhaled deeply of the brisk, crisp air. "To escape the red, go into the red."

It was true that these words made no sense to Patreese. But he argued no further, and demanded no additional explanation, for he now knew that he would follow his daughter's urging, sharing her cryptic warning with all the village rats and doing what he could to convince every one of them to leave. And he knew this for one simple reason.

When Latura had spoken just now, it had not been in her own voice.

Patreese put his arm around his daughter's shoulders, guiding her back toward the village at his side.

"Guess I'd better look inta seein' if I c'n round us up some boots, huh?"


	2. Chapter 1

**CHAPTER ONE**

Extract from the journal of Winokur Otter, Recorder of Redwall Abbey:

_The Winter of the Great Accord has given way to the Spring of Freedom!_

_It speaks to the momentous nature of these times that this season and last were both named with the same event in mind. I am speaking, of course, of the peace treaty which was signed late last summer between Urthblood, Badger Lord of the mountain fortress of Salamandastron, and Tratton, King of the Searats. Never before has such a truce been attempted between these two ancient adversaries, the warrior guardians of the natural stronghold on the shores of the Western Sea and the tyrants of wave and wake who have sought time and again throughout the generations to conquer Salamandastron and make it their own. If any single incident has ever justified having two seasons named for it - even an incident which transpired far from our peaceful haven here in the heart of Mossflower Woods - surely this is it!_

_It cannot be denied that our dear Abbot Geoff took his share of guff from some of the Abbeybeasts here for his choice of a name for the winter season just passed. For one thing, our resident hares of the Long Patrol - valiant fighters who served Urthblood's brother Urthfist when those two mighty badgers clashed over the rule of Salamandastron two summers ago - still regard Urthblood with the highest mistrust, thinking him a creature of pure evil. Colonel Clewiston and his fellow hares point to his pact with Tratton as proof of their long-held suspicion that Urthblood always intended to forge an alliance with the Searat King, an alliance which would allow the two warlords to conquer all the lands and place every creature from the Northlands to Southsward under an unforgiving yoke of tyranny._

_While most of us do not share our good hares' steadfast conviction that some unspeakable doom is about to break upon us, we are not without our apprehensions. Urthblood has never moved against us openly - indeed, he first visited us with a force of arms more than adequate to crush us completely had that been his intent and did not do so, and insists to this day that he considers Redwall a staunch ally against troubles to come - but this cannot erase the fact that we find so many of his past actions highly questionable ... not least of which was his duplicitous use of our fair home in his feud with his brother, luring Urthfist out of Salamandastron with contemptible reports of a massacre of our Abbey leaders. And then there are all the new and terrible weapons Urthblood has used more recently, both in his war with Tratton (although that badger's supporters maintain it was those very tactics which ultimately forced the Searat King to the negotiating table) and in the conflict with the renegade shrew leader Snoga, a clash so savage and tumultuous that it has come to be known as the Shrew War, even if that war will be remembered more for Urthblood's part in it than anything. His own otters found their badger master's use of burning, poisonous vapors against Snoga (and some of Snoga's otter allies) so outrageous that they broke with Urthblood, and the otters of the Northlands serve Urthblood no more._

_If our hare friends cannot see Urthblood in anything less than the starkest terms of black and white, then the former slaves in our midst must view him with the full range of mixed emotions. Of course they owe him their freedom, since most of them were liberated in that badger's initial assaults upon Tratton's labor camps. And the provision of the Accord which calls for the release of every slave under searat bondage - every innocent mouse, mole, hedgehog, squirrel, otter and shrew who was ever snatched from honest trader vessels plying the open ocean or abducted during corsair land raids or stolen from their loved ones - must surely gladden the heart of anybeast who once knew the stinging lash of the slavemaster's whip or the cold embrace of iron around wrist and ankle._

_But even this cannot entirely quell the qualms of Redwallers so recently delivered from their chains. They see Tratton as the Long Patrol hares see Urthblood: as the ultimate threat to peace and freedom, as the great taker and keeper of slaves and fearsome terror of the high seas, and the cruel and treacherous overlord of an empire bereft of compassion or respect toward any creature of good will. In their eyes, the Searat King is a monster of monsters, master of a corrupt kingdom of pillage and oppression and murder. To them, there can be no treating with such a beast, for any pledge or promise issued by him is more worthless than the parchment it's scrawled upon, and less substantial than the air used to give those words breath._

_Yet treat with Tratton Urthblood did, and the result is a treaty unprecedented in all the lands and on all the seas. It remains to be seen whether Tratton plans to uphold his end of the agreement - or, for that matter, whether Urthblood does either. But the agreement itself is an accomplished fact, ending hostilities between longtime foes and promising much more besides. Geoff, being the former historian that he is, cannot help but regard these matters in an historic light. Whatever may come of it, the treaty is undeniably a great feat, and thus is entered into our records as the Great Accord. Whether it is a_ good _accord, only time will tell._

_Which leads us to this season, and its name. Certainly, we have known of the Accord since late last summer, when Urthblood's messenger birds carried news of those events to Redwall. And we saw the first results of the treaty for ourselves by late autumn, when the slaves liberated during those very negotiations found their way to our gates in advance of the winter snows. So, in one sense, calling this the Spring of Freedom might seem long overdue, and yet in other ways it still feels premature. No further freed slaves have come to us since, even though we have been assured that many, many more are to be loosed from searat chains. We have heard many explanations for this delay, ranging from the wide expanses covered by Tratton's vast empire to the logistics of delivering so many creatures over to Urthblood's forces for resettlement, to the mere fact that forcing them to travel overland in the depths of winter would simply prove too much of a strain. I tend to favor the last reason; surely these slaves have endured such hardships that a winter march might be more than they can suffer._

_But, if they're not here, then where are they?_

_Salamandastron is everybeast's best guess. We've not had any news from that seaside mountain fortress for half a season now, and the last reports we did hear were full of vague assurances that things were proceeding apace and that it would take time for so many indentured creatures to be carried to freedom's shores. Perhaps, even as I write these words, some still languish in servitude, awaiting the turn of their taskmaster's key in the lock to open their fetters for the last time. Perhaps some of Tratton's captains are not so keen on parting with this valuable labor pool, and seek to resist the royal decree or even defy their king outright. Perhaps word of this edict is still filtering its way through the empire. But even if every slave were already released, the matter of transporting them all back to Mossflower and Southsward and the Northlands, from every corner of Tratton's far-flung maritime realm, would undoubtedly present a formidable challenge. The delays we see now may well have been inevitable, even if all else goes as it was meant to._

_I have stood within Salamandastron - dined and slept in its chambers and wandered the multilevel labyrinth of its rock-hewn passages - so I can appreciate the spaciousness of that natural citadel. I have heard Salamandastron referred to as an entire town inside a mountain, and having seen it with my own eyes, I can certainly agree with such an assessment. Geoff has told me that, according to our records, there have been times in the distant past when the Long Patrol numbered as many as a thousand, all dwelling within that fortress at the same time. By all accounts, Lord Urthblood's forces currently stationed there total less than a third of that ... which means that he could conceivably have enough spare room to billet more liberated slaves than the entire present population of Redwall! Given this, I suspect that these refugees of the Searat Empire have indeed wintered at Salamandastron, awaiting the milder days to commence their journeys to their new homes, wherever those homes will be._

_Still, it would be courteous of Urthblood to let us know, wouldn't it?_

_If hundreds more slaves are yet to be freed, and if any great portion of them do end up making their way to our fair Abbey with the desire to settle here permanently, then this will cause us some undeniable housing issues. Our friends the Guosim - the Guerilla Union of Shrews in Mossflower - have spent yet another winter with us, as has become their custom, but if their ranks of over two hundred strong sounds daunting, their small stature and willingness to sleep in the open on the floor of our Cavern Hole gathering space allows us to accommodate them with no great inconvenience. Naturally, such informal arrangements would hardly do for new members of our family looking to make Redwall their year-round home. Clearly, something will have to be done._

_Lekkas, the stalwart mouse who's adopted the mantle of unofficial spokesbeast for all the former slaves now residing with us, has already held some discussions with Abbot Geoff regarding this very matter. Hundreds more creatures settling at Redwall would practically require us to construct an entire additional wing to our Abbey, or else drastically expand our underground living tunnels far beyond what we did even for the Long Patrol warrens. And while I suppose we could wait to take any action until we know with certainty just how many more sanctuary-seekers we may expect, that will hardly put us in good stead if a small army of them shows up at our gates all at once! It's looking as if the sandstone quarry across the River Moss shall have to be reopened yet again, no matter what form our ultimate solution to this quandary may take._

_Of one thing we can be certain: No matter how much new stone we shall have to mine for any new construction projects we are forced to undertake at Redwall, it will still pale in comparison to the sheer quantity excavated four seasons ago for the building of Foxguard. That garrison for Urthblood's elite swordfox brigade has become a permanent fixture in the landscape of Mossflower, its thousand-step-high central observation tower soaring to heights unimaginable and dominating the surrounding forestlands in every direction. Many times this past winter, usually on the milder days, I would go up to stand on our own walltop battlements to gaze at that red spire. As imposing and incredible as it is at other times of year, there's something about the crisp, clear air of the coldest season that more sharply defines it and brings it into clearer focus, that makes it appear more real than reality itself, which lends it a surreal quality. I've felt at times like I could simply reach out and touch it, even though it's clear on the other side of the Moss, half a day's march away. Having stood upon the pinnacle of that impossible edifice, I have seen for myself how the lands lay under its gaze to north, south, east and west like a living map, and how even our grand Abbey looks like a mere youngster's plaything from such an altitude. The very presence of Foxguard has altered the landscape of Mossflower forever, giving this region a second bastion of strength to stand alongside Redwall for the safety and security of the lands. It is a very good thing that we remain on friendly terms with those foxes (even if the Long Patrol harbor their suspicions of those swordsbeasts, just as they do with all creatures in Urthblood's service), and we all hope these warm relations endure far into the future._

_As it turns out, the waylaid slaves are not the only delinquent beasts whose arrival we are awaiting. Last summer, at the same time Urthblood informed us of his truce with Tratton, he also alerted us to expect a large company of his Gawtrybe squirrel warriors whom he planned to redeploy to Mossflower from Salamandastron, now that they would no longer be needed in full strength to safeguard the coastlands. But they have yet to appear either. I suspect the reason for this must be the same as for the slaves: that this grand project of Urthblood's has proven more complicated than anybeast supposed, and if all those squirrels are no longer required for defensive purposes, then they are being kept quite busy with other tasks related to receiving all the freed slaves and seeing to their needs. While I suppose it's possible that they could have left the mountain and journeyed to Mossflower by some alternate route that didn't bring them near Redwall, that hardly seems likely. For one thing, Lady Mina calls our Abbey home these days, and she is the High Lady of all the Gawtrybe, wherever they may be found; I would deem it inconceivable that any sizable contingent of them might be bound for our neck of the woods and not visit Redwall, to pay her their respects if nothing else. For another, their ultimate destination was to have been Foxguard, and Tolar - the grand high Sword of Urthblood's fox brigade - was with us for Nameday just three days ago, and if the Gawtrybe had arrived at his fortress, he surely would have told us._

_And so here we stand, poised on the threshold of yet another new season. The name Geoff has chosen for it reflects not so much the state of affairs as they currently stand as it does the promise we all hope to see realized as this Spring of Freedom unfolds. There is a sense, here at Redwall and perhaps pervading much of nearby Mossflower as well, of fate holding its breath over the lands, waiting to exhale. Sweeping events, grandiose plans, and bold destinies hang in the balance, awaiting their transformation from dream to reality. Only the fullness of time will reveal the final shape and scope of these potential destinies._

_My, I hadn't meant to go off on such a prolonged historical dissertation there, especially since so many of these events have been covered and touched upon in my previous entries over the past two seasons. But that is often the way of things with us aspiring historians; we sometimes like to recapitulate events to bring them all together in our minds, as well as on the page. It certainly helps to keep straight tangled webs of happenstance when they grow too confusing. At least that seems to have been the tendency of so many of our past Recorders, judging by what I've seen when perusing their journals, and now that I have been tasked with the responsibility of carrying on this important role and tradition, I may as well adopt the habits that have served my predecessors so well._

_So that is how things stand at Redwall today. Tolar and his foxes have returned to Foxguard, unlikely to appear at our gates again until we issue them an invitation for our summer Nameday celebration. I may try to drop by their fortress myself sometime around midseason to visit my friend Roxroy again; he's recently been graduated from cadet status to full-fledged swordfox of the brigade, and I don't know when I've ever seen a prouder or happier beast than he was during this last Nameday feast! When we first befriended each other, Rox and I would sometimes engage in playful sparring - his sword against my javelin - but for the past two seasons his skills have advanced to the degree that such contests became pointless. He may be "just" a recently-promoted cadet, but his finesse and surety with his blade far surpasses that of any Redwaller. If he continues to develop his talents at this pace, I can easily envision a day in some season to come when he takes Tolar's place as Sword of Foxguard. No new slaves have arrived since autumn, nor have the Gawtrybe yet to appear. We assume that peace holds between Urthblood and Tratton, although in all truth, the great events along the shores of the Western Sea in recent seasons have always seemed so remote, I sometimes wonder if it makes any real difference to us here at Redwall whether Badger Lord and Searat King are at peace or at war. Our own young badger Metellus continues his schooling in the healing arts, and he as well as I may find himself back at Foxguard before very long, in his case to study further at the side of Tolar's miraculous healer vixen Mona._

_Thankfully, our large Redwall family has enjoyed generally good health as of late, with nary a need for any healer at all - last season's harrowing scare with Vanessa notwithstanding. Everybeast here still talks about that incident - what it means, and what it might portend. Our dear stricken former Abbess - still, alas, reduced to her childlike state by the stone she took to the temple during Snoga's attack on Foxguard last spring - keeling over out of the blue like that, with no warning or reason. All her playmates thought she was simply pulling another of her infamous pranks, but when our otter Skipper Montybank bent down to examine her, he could find no heartbeat, nor did she seem to be breathing at all. Old Arlyn was summoned with utmost haste, since that retired Abbot mouse qualifies as the closest thing we have to a full-time healer these days, but before he could arrive on the scene, Vanessa's eyes popped open again and she started glancing all about her as if she couldn't begin to imagine how she'd come to be the center of so much concerned attention. Laughing off everybeast's consternation, she dismissed her near-mortal swoon with a statement equally silly and cryptic: "Oh, I suppose I must have been off somewhere else for a moment there."_

_Arlyn and our Badger Mother Maura ordered her straight to bed where her condition could be monitored, but Vanessa being Vanessa, she would have none of it, skittering away the moment all eyes were turned to resume her romping and playing all throughout the Abbey. Mona the vixen had warned us, in the wake of Vanessa's initial wounding, that brain injuries can be both tricky and mysterious, and that while Vanessa might appear most of the time as tireless and energetic as a creature one third her age, her health might be hanging in a precarious state, and there was even the chance that she could topple over and simply die at any moment ..._

_Just as she very nearly appeared to do a little over a fortnight ago._

_We cannot figure or fathom it. Such a medical mystery lies far beyond the scope of Arlyn's healer's knowledge, and not even Mona could account for it when presented with this episode's details during her recent Nameday visit with us. Whatever struck Vanessa down so suddenly, leaving her seemingly bereft of life, reversed itself as enigmatically as it appeared, restoring her just as she'd been before. At least she was able to be with us for another Nameday, and has shown no signs of relapse. I suppose that as long as fate deems to keep Vanessa with us, we shall just have to consider ourselves lucky for each and every day._

_But now on to cheerier matters - and what could be cheerier than a Redwall celebration? And with our last one now three days behind us, that means it's time to look ahead to the next! As everybeast knows, the arrival of spring means it can't be long before our Guosim friends venture forth from our walls to undertake their shrewish wanderings for their warm-weather adventures. Another full-scale feast so soon after Nameday might be a bit much, but that hardly prohibits us from arranging festivities to see them off on their way. And this spring, it just so happens that an idea occurred to me which everybeast agrees will present a novel and joyous way to send them off in fitting style. I will admit the notion probably never would have crossed my mind if I weren't also serving as Redwall's primary teacher these days, but daily exposure to those bright and eager young minds can certainly aid one's inspiration!_

_And speaking of those bright young minds, the first of my pupils are filing into our classroom even as I scribble these musings, so let me conclude this entry right here. Because fur knows, once the likes of Droge, Budsock, Pirkko and perhaps even Vanessa herself appear on the scene, I won't be able to concentrate on stringing words together. And that's not even taking into account our fidgety, flighty (and oh so verbose) trio of sparrow students!_

_So here I will end this. Now, if all you figments of future history will excuse me, I have to go put on my eyepatch._

00000000000

"AAARRRRG! Avast 'n' ahoy, ya scabby, scurvy seadogs!"

All his students tittered and giggled as Winokur stomped around the front of the classroom, swinging his wooden prop sword this way and that with melodramatic flair. Tied to the end of the otter Recorder's thick tail was a length of seasons-softened rope, tipped with a feathery pompom.

"I'm Cluny the Scourge!" Winokur bellowed with playful villainy, swishing his adorned rudder for added effect. "Vilest an' most fearsome bilgerat who ever jumped from ship to shore! Arrr!"

Cuffy the dormouse broke into the youthful merriment of his classmates to offer his criticism of the otter instructor's performance. "Cluny never talked like _that_!"

Winokur fixed his vocal pupil with his one uncovered eye, the bemused smile never entirely leaving his lips. Leaning heavily on Cuffy's desk, he challenged, "An' just how would _you_ know that, Cuff me muff?"

"'Cos Cluny t'weren't a pirate! 'Ee came to Redwall with his army of rats in a horse-drawn cart, right down th' main path!"

"Horses! Pah! What kind o' mythological beast is that? Might as well talk o' dragons 'n' sea serpints! Who here's ever even seen a horse?"

No child there spoke out, for truly, not a one of them had ever seen a horse.

Winokur straightened, flipping his costume eyepatch up onto his forehead and blinking at the sudden return of stereoscopic vision. "There's a great deal of mythology surrounding Cluny the Scourge," he said to the class, lapsing back into his more formal teacher's tone. "His army's arrival at Redwall in a vast, horse-drawn cart, big enough to hold hundreds of rats, is one such legend. Another - which may even be true - holds that Cluny may indeed have spent time at sea before commencing his reign of terror upon the lands, and ultimately suffering his final defeat when he made the fatal mistake of trying to conquer Redwall. Although I've always wondered, if he was such a fearsome, raging tyrant of the seas, why would he give up that power to try his paw on land?" Winokur shrugged. "Maybe he was just tired of getting bilgewater between his toes all the time - who knows? But Cluny most certainly could have been a pirate in his early days!"

"A pirate like King Tratton?" ventured Francy the mouse.

"Er ... no, not really. There's never been a Searat King like Tratton before. If Cluny really was a pirate at one time, he most likely was no more than captain of his own ship. Tratton has a whole fleet of frigates and galleons and dreadnoughts serving under him, each with its own captain and crew. In that sense, he's more like Gabool the Wild, who lived in the time of our great heroine Mariel. In fact, Tratton built his fortress on the island of Terramort, on the exact spot where Gabool's stronghold Fort Bladegirt once stood." Winokur flipped his eyepatch back in place. "Or so 'tis said, me liddle hearties! Yarr harr harr!"

"Does Tratton talk like that?" asked Cuffy.

"Um, no, I don't imagine so," Winokur replied, taken somewhat off guard by this line of questioning.

"Well, then why would Cluny talk that way either, even if he had been a pirate?"

The otter Recorder glanced aside to his assistant teacher Cyrus. "See what I have to put up with?" he complained to the adolescent mouse - all in fun, of course. "And what you'll have to put up with too someday, when you take over these classes for me?"

"Oh, I've seen far worse," said Cyrus, who was in his third season of serving as Winokur's assistant - and had been a student himself before that. "But hopefully that won't be for many seasons to come."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that, Cy. At the rate these play preparations are going, I'd not be surprised if they put both me and Geoff in early graves ... and then you'd get to be promoted to both Recorder _and_ Abbot!"

The play in question was Winokur's brainchild, although as soon as Abbot Geoff had caught wind of it, the former historian had insisted on being a part of it as well. With the impending departure of the Guosim, Wink had decided to combine his scholarly lessons with a grand entertainment for young and old alike. Quite simply, he (and now Geoff too) would write a trio of very simple plays depicting key figures and moments from Redwall history - all, of course, to be portrayed by the Abbey youngsters. And Pirkko - son of Log-a-Log, the Guosim's chieftain - would naturally have his pick of the juiciest roles and plum parts for himself, since the whole presentation would serve as the centerpiece of the shrews' farewell festival.

"If Tratton an' Cluny coulda fought each other," asked Cuffy, "who'd win?"

"In single combat, you mean?" Winokur pursed his lips in consideration. "Well, Tratton's said to be a master with his blade, but Cluny had that long tail of his, with the poisoned barb at its tip, which would give him a longer reach." To underscore his point, he waggled his rudder, which sent his own mock rat's tail lashing to and fro, its lethal feathered pompom careening this way and that. "Then again, Cluny only had one eye, which might prove a major disadvantage in any contest with a highly-skilled fighter. And I suppose that if Tratton were quick enough to cut off the end of Cluny's tail when Cluny tried to use it as a whip, then our current Searat King might be able to win the day. You know, this kind of speculation reminds me of when Lord Urthblood's army arrived at Redwall seven seasons ago. At the time, somebeast wondered whether those Northlanders could have bested Cluny's legendary horde. Knowing what we do today, it's clear that it would have been no contest. Cluny's gang wouldn't have stood a chance."

An otter named Wronk raised his paw. "But if'n King Tratton's gone an' built 'is fortress right where Gabool's used to be, ain't 'ee afraid Gabool's ghost is gonna come haunt 'im in th' night?"

Winokur chuckled. "Some would say it's Tratton who haunts ghosts, not the other way 'round. But I wager that sea lord's got bigger things to worry about than some old madrat's restless spirit. Although I suspect that if Gabool's ghost ever set his mind to it, he could slowly drive poor Tratton insane ... just as Gabool himself was driven mad by a bell that rang of its own accord to constantly remind him of his wickedness. But that, my young friends, is a tale for another day!"

Two figures appeared in the classroom doorway then, sparing Winokur from further fanciful inquires by his adventurous-minded pupils. "Ah! I told you we'd be having a special guest for today's class, and here he is now! Along with our very own Abbot! That makes this surprise twice as special!"

Abbot Geoff and the hare Browder, the two of them now the riveted center of attention for every eye upon them, proceeded to the front of the room. Geoff was a familiar fixture in this chamber, having served for many seasons as the Abbey's teacher; in fact, nearly every student present could remember having him as their instructor before Winokur. In his paw the Abbot clutched a sheaf of loose pages; Wink eyed them with a mildly dubious gaze. "So, um, to what do we owe this pleasure?"

Taking that as his cue, Geoff proudly held forth the parchments. "I've written some more scenes for our play! I can't believe we left out Boar the Fighter from our presentation about Martin the Warrior! Martin's journey to Salamandastron was a key element in the Wildcat Wars! And these days, with that mountain fortress and its current Badger Lord weighing so heavily in current events, all the more reason to include that episode in our script!"

"Um, yes, that was an important episode," Winokur conceded, hesitantly accepting the pages from Geoff and setting them on his desk. "Unfortunately, so were a number of other historically significant details I was forced to omit for this dramatic effort of ours. We're doing three short one-act plays as an after-dinner entertainment, not an all-day epic!"

Geoff looked crestfallen. "But, aren't you even going to look at them? I was up past midnight drafting those scenes ... "

"I'm sorry, but our eager young thespians here are having trouble enough memorizing the lines they've already got. If we pile any more on top of that, I'm afraid their poor brains will tie themselves in knots, and they won't be able to recite a single word when it's time to perform!"

From behind Geoff piped the clear, penetrating voice of one of Winokur's sparrow students. "Too many lines, Abbot Pinky!"

Geoff spun round at this invocation of his dreaded childhood nickname. All his life he'd possessed a nose quite pink in hue, even by mouse standards, but no Redwaller had dared display the impropriety to address him so disrespectfully since Geoff's elevation to Abbot. "All right - which one of you feathered reprobates said that?"

Harpreet, Skytop and Brybag sat looking up at Geoff from the rumpled blankets that served as their seats, their unreadable beaked expressions betraying neither guilt nor innocence.

"It. Wasn't. Me," all three chirped in perfect unison; having spent nearly three seasons in Redwall school, each of the trio had cultivated great pride in their precise, most unsparrowlike enunciation, and often bit off each word of a sentence as its own separate statement to emphasize their verbal alacrity.

Geoff regarded them with a dour face. "Fibbing is hardly commendable Redwall conduct, and fibbing to your Abbot even less so ... especially after insulting him!" He turned to Winokur with an equally jaundiced scowl. "Makes me question my wisdom in naming my successor. Is this what you've been teaching them?"

Winokur, stung by this mild reprimand, sought to defend himself. "They certainly didn't learn that from me, Abbot! I've never uttered that nickname to any of my students!"

Geoff's expression of irritation softened to one of mere resignation. "Must've been that sorry excuse we've got for an otter Skipper, Montybank. He never could resist a dig at my dignity, even when we were youngsters."

"I rather suspect it was more likely Highwing," Winokur said, "since these fledglings spend far more time up in Warbeak Loft than they do with us ground creatures, Not much to be done about it, if he's the culprit; one can't very well discipline the King of the Sparra, can one?"

"I've half a mind to try, the next time he swoops down here from his royal court to scoff up all the delicacies we 'groundcrawlers' go to the trouble of preparing for him. Why, that danderbottom was still in his chick's down when Vanessa and I rescued him from that fiend Grym Sparra. Sometimes I think we'd have been better off leaving our flighty friend to the mercy of that bully!"

"Oh, you don't mean that!" Winokur laughed. "If not for Highwing, the two halves of Redwall might still be at odds, with the Sparra folk and ground-living beasts still estranged. Or would you rather still have Grym and his ilk to worry about, every time you felt like taking a stroll across our lush lawns or relaxing by the pond on a warm summer's day?"

"Or puttin' on a play!" Droge put in with his usual ebullience.

"No, I suppose not," Geoff admitted. "It's just that today's youth often show so little respect for their elders ... "

"Aw, we respect ya, Abbot!" Budsock encouraged. "Don't pay no heed to those birdbrains - they eat worms, after all!"

"And a diet like that will surely wear at a creature's sense of decorum," Winokur joked as he took Geoff by the shoulder and guided the Abbot mouse toward the single adult-sized chair behind his teacher's desk. "Here, why don't you just rest your tail there and let everybeast else do all the work? We couldn't wish for a more esteemed audience for these rehearsals!"

"Wormfood tastygood!" Harpreet trilled in Sparra vernacular as Geoff was shown to his place of honor behind Winokur's desk.

The otter instructor addressed his pupils once more. "Okay, class, and now it's time for us to receive some acting pointers from a master of the craft! You all know Browder, our resident non-Long Patrol hare, but what you may not know, since he's never had much opportunity to practice his skills here at Redwall, is that Browder was once one of the most renowned player hares in all the Northlands, performing before common folk and ruling courts alike! And he has graciously agreed to help direct our plays, to offer us the full benefit of his thespian wisdom and expertise so that we can give the most professional performances that we can come showtime!"

"A professional blodger's more like it," Droge snickered, causing Budsock, Pirkko and a few of the others sitting nearby to chuckle and snigger in amusement. None of them knew what the word meant, but it seemed to fit Browder perfectly.

"Hey, steady on, steady on there, wot?" Browder said as he assumed his spot at the front of the class; even with his sharp hare's hearing, he'd not been able to make out the hedgehog lad's words, but he safely and correctly assumed them to be anything but flattering. "Can't have any catcalls from bally balconies or grousing from the groundlings, don'tcha know. Now then, as our right rudderly Recorder's just explained, I'm here to bestow upon you junior understudies the secrets of the actor's craft, pointers to make your performances stupendous and to dazzle the bloomin' daylights out of audiences from Southsward to Salamandastron!"

"Um, Browder?"

"Yes, Abbot chappie?"

"They're only going to be putting on their play here at Redwall. And it's only going to be a onetime performance, done entirely for fun - and with limited lines, as I've just been so cogently reminded by Brother Winokur and his rather forthright pupils. Nobeast here is looking to become a full-time player."

"Ah, but we can't jolly well be sure of that, can we? No tellin' which of these wee beasties might be bitten by the old acting bug, wot? Daresn't go nipping such budding aspirations in the bud, hmm? Now then, just what immortal classics of the stage will be on this programme?"

"New classics, actually," Wink answered with a smirk. "Nothing you've had occasion to perform previously, I'm sure, since Geoff and I have only just written them. We'll be presenting the stories of Martin and Tsarmina, Matthias and Cluny, and the Taggerung."

"An' I get to be th' Taggerung!" Wronk burst out, unable to contain his enthusiasm at the prospect.

"Um, yes, quite, I'm sure," Browder said. "And a positively spiffin' job you'll make of it, I imagine, wotever the bally blazes a Taggerung is."

"Told you we should have gone with Rakkety Tam instead," Geoff softly murmured to Winokur.

"Yes, but then we'd have Budsock all in a tizzy over his lead part instead of Wronk. Bit of a pawful either way ... "

Browder kept his gaze on the young otter. "So, am I to assume you're th' bloomin' star of these proceedings?"

Pirkko neary jumped out of his seat. "No, that's me! I get t' play Martin _and_ Matthias!"

The hare cocked an appraising eyebrow. "Y' don't say? Hmm ... well, I suppose shrews are very nearly mouse-like. Of course, a truly proficient practitioner of the playerly arts such as myself can impersonate any species he wants. Why, I've donned otter rudders and badger stripes, bat wings and fox brushes, mouse ears and hedgehog spikes - "

"Didja ever play a mole?" Budsock interrupted.

"Um, no, can't say I recall that I have."

"Too bad," the squirrel child went on. "'Cos then you could burrow yourself deep underground where we wouldn't be able t' hear you anymore!'

"Hrmph! Just for that, you impertinent little treewalloper, you'll get no pers'nal instruction for this hare! Hope you've got one of the lead parts, too. Serves you bally well right if you freeze up an' forget all your lines in front of the whole bloomin' Abbey! Now then, mouseyshrew, up here front and center! Gotta take measure of what calibre of talent I'll be working with, wot?"

Pirkko, not at all timid or abashed about being the center of attention, sprang from his chair and bounded up to the front of the room. Some of his friends egged him on with cheers and calls of encouragement.

Browder took stock of the diminutive shrew, walking in a complete circle around Pirkko while looking his student up and down. "Hmm. Ahmm. Well, you're certainly enthusiastic enough, I must say. Not exactly warriorlike, though, but we'll fix that in a trice! Once we channel all that youthful pep 'n' vigor in the proper bally direction, then top it all off with the appropriate costumes an' props, you'll be the finest mousey swordswinger any shrew ever was, or I'm a blowfish! Now then, first things first, an' that's to get you standing like a proper warrior. Nobeast'll take you for a hero all slouchy 'n' fidgety like that. Chin up! Chest out! Shoulders squared! Make us all believe you've slain the worst vermin sorts about, wot!"

As he commenced his coaching, Browder laid his paws on Pirkko as if the young shrew was a malleable mannequin to be posed according to the hare's whim. Nonplussed by this unexpected physical contact, Pirkko looked to the other two adults in the room.

"Abbot! Brother Winokur! He's _touchin'_ me!"

Geoff and Wink traded glances. "Whose idea was it again to invite Browder into this?" the mouse asked.

"Either yours or mine - I forget," Winokur replied. "But now that our fabled thespian and our energetic students are stuck with each other, I'll be most interested to see who gets the worst of the deal!"


	3. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER TWO**

Patreese never did find boots for himself or Latura, but they left their village anyway.

Now, after many days of trudging through the wilds of southeastern Mossflower, the rat refugees were happy for the longer, milder spring days that had lately replaced the dying-winter gloom under which they'd commenced their uncertain quest. Their rather sorry company consisted of a mere seven members: Patreese, Latura, her brother Castor, and the only other four villagers they'd been able to convince to join them. The vast majority of their neighbors - including many who, under other circumstances, might have taken the prescient ratmaid's forebodings to heart - had opted to remain where they were, choosing the solid and real security of the only home most of them had ever known over the vague, shadowy warnings of an odd youth whose sanity lay in some question. The stay-behinds had even begrudged the travellers any significant provisions from the village stores; it had been a long winter, after all, and larders were low. In the end, Patreese had successfully argued that their mouths would be taking in the same amount of food regardless of whether they remained in the village or were off marching elsewhere. And so their band departed with enough supplies to see them into early spring - if they rationed their provisions sparingly.

Early spring was now upon them, and their supplies were nearly at an end. The awakening forest lay vital and verdant all about them - but that availed the seven rats little, for the first fruits were still at least a season away, and none of them felt much like satisfying their hunger with leaves and blossoms.

Although it was reaching a point where they soon might not have much choice in the matter.

The company halted at a small stream. A sturdy rat named Strack knelt down on the mossy bank and dipped his canteen into the clear-running current to refill it. "At least we'll not go thirsty, even if our bellies start grumblin'."

"Mine's already grumblin' aplenty," said Castor, stooping to fill the common water pouch he carried for himself, Latura and their father. "We'll be down to gnawin' on old roots 'n' last season's acorns 'fore much longer."

Strack stood and looked back at the three stragglers bringing up the rear of their party. "Could be worse, Cass. Least you ain't in a family way."

Latura, at her father's side, glanced back over her shoulder to follow Strack's gaze. "Empty!"

Mathurin grimaced at this juvenile outburst as he helped his wife Turma along the forest path toward the stream. "Gah! Does that dimwit hafta keep callin' us that? T'aint very respectful. Gets kinda grating, after awhile."

Latura, with her mental shortcomings over remembering names and faces, had assigned Mathurin and his pregnant mate a joint designation very early in their travels that enabled her feeble memory skills to retain a recognizable identity for the couple: since one name began with an "m" and the other with a "t," Latura had simply run the two initials together. Thus, since the beginning of their march together, Mathurin and Turma had become "Empty" to the simple ratmaid.

And if Latura was even aware of the unflattering nature of this nickname, she never showed it.

"Hey, at least she remembers who you two are, an' calls you _something_," Strack said to them, then turned to Latura. "'ey, Lattie, what's my name again?"

She stared hard at the strapping male, as if she'd just been presented with the mystery of the ages. "Is this a test?"

"Only if you want it t' be," Strack answered without any particular malice or menace.

Patreese and Castor wore mildly tortured expressions at this chiding of their blood relation, but held their silence. What was there to say?

Latura blinked and then asked, as if the conversation were only just starting with her, "I'm sorry. What was your name again?"

Strack rolled his eyes and turned away.

"Can somerat remind me again why we're followin' this addle-brained imbecile 'alfway across Mossflower?" Turma grumbled, settling herself down on a tussock to take the weight off her weary footpaws and swollen ankles.

Strack looked to Turma, squaring his shoulders. "I'm followin' Lattie 'cos she's been right more often than not over th' seasons, 'bout things more important than less so, an' this sounded too dire t' risk stayin' behind where she said calamity's gonna befall. That's why I'm 'ere." He nodded toward Patreese and Castor. "As fer Patty 'n' Cass, well, they're her kinfolk, an' once she made it clear she was gonna leave come what may, they really had no choice if they was any kinda real family, did they? An' then there's Palts back there ... " Strack indicated the trailing rat, who was still working his way up the path behind them. "I reckon we c'n all guess ol' Palter only came along 'cos he's allers had eyes fer Lattie."

"Like that'll ever happen," Patreese muttered under his breath, eliciting a snigger from Castor. Latura's male sibling never had to worry much about fulfilling the role of protective older brother, at least not in romantic matters, since Latura wouldn't recognize a romantic overture if it hit her over the head, and was bound to leave any potential suitor in confused frustration with her fractured manner and inability to grasp so many obvious, everyday facts.

"An' as fer you two," Strack concluded, taking in the husband and wife of their company, "you'd not be here neither unless you wanted to come with us ... as ye've made clear any number o' times."

Mathurin nodded. "Aye, 'tis true. Even if t'weren't fer Lattie's prophecy, I'd still want a better life fer my wife 'n' liddle one than any we coulda had back in that village." He reached down and lovingly ran a paw across his mate's belly; in truth, Turma was barely beginning to show, and for the most part she looked as fit as any rat among them. "I want th' best fer my son ... "

"Or daughter," Turma sharply added.

Mathurin refused to be baited by Turma's curt tone. "If it's a lass, I hope she's just like you," he said with undisguised adoration. "I just hope we can get t' Redwall 'fore you get too far along ... "

Strack snorted. "We don't even know fer sure that it's Redwall we're headed for."

"It's gotta be!" Mathurin insisted with the fervor of a true believer. "You all 'eard what Patty told us Lattie said that day, 'bout gettin' inside someplace red t' escape whatever's comin'. Naught else it could be!"

"We don't even know if that place's real or a myth," Strack countered. Only a pawful of rats in their village had ever heard of Redwall, and then only as a misty legend or cautionary tale whispered down generations or imparted by passing travellers. Certainly, none had known where it was located or how to get there. "We don't even know if we're headin' th' right way ... "

"North an' west," Latura interjected to challenge Strack's doubting air. "We go north an' west." And then just as abruptly she zoned back out of the discussion, withdrawing into whatever private ruminations and secret worlds she more frequently enjoyed and inhabited.

The final laggard of their procession ambled forward to join the rest of them. Palter was as scrawny as Strack was burly, and had a tendency to hobble slightly due to constantly stubbing his toes on rocks and protruding tree roots. His travel cloak showed as dingier and more threadbare than those of the others - not that any of them sported what could be called finery - and unlike the other males present, he carried only the bare minimum supplies of a personal bedroll and his own scant provisions, which were running as low as those of his companions.

"Why're we all stopped 'ere?" he inquired hopefully in his usual nasal wheeze. "Didja find some food?"

"Sure," Strack ridiculed, pointing at the stream. "We got a full menu 'ere fer yer pleasure - water stew 'n' water salad, with a nice big water cake fer dessert!"

"Sounds watery," Latura absently put in from the fringes of the conversation.

Palter regarded the stream with weak optimism. "Mebbe there's some fish in there we c'd catch an' cook up ... ?"

"That'd be fine," said Castor, "'cept what all seven of us know 'bout fishin' put t'gether wouldn't catch us a single fish. We got no nets, no hooks ner lines, no bait ... an' that means one thing: No fish."

Patreese shook his own haversack, dismayed at the lightness of it. "Palter's right about one thing, tho': We better find some food soon - or find this Redwall place even sooner - or else we'll be in a bad way, an' no two ways 'bout it!"

"We got some decent rain night 'fore last," said Castor. "Mebbe if we're lucky it'll bring up some mushrooms ... "

"With our luck," groused Turma as she massaged her footpaws, "they'd be poisonous toadstools instead!"

"Toadstools?" Palter quailed. "How would we tell them from mushrooms that are safe to eat?"

"Lattie'd know," Castor assured the panicky rat. "She allers knows 'bout things like that."

"A whole world's worth o' Lattie's foodsense won't do us a bit o' good unless we find some 'shrooms first," said Patreese, "an' I ain't seen any yet, so it's all just jabberin' 'bout pies made o' air right now."

Latura smacked her lips. "Mmm - pie!"

Mathurin ran his gaze around their small clearing by the streambank. "So, are we gonna stop 'ere fer th' night? Seems like it'd be a good spot fer makin' camp ... "

Patreese shook his head. "Naw, we still got lotsa daylight left. We oughta put more miles under our paws 'fore we bed down."

"The old one's right," Strack agreed. "Every step further along's one step closer t' where we wanna be ... an' where food might be too." He glanced toward Turma. "Unless you need t' call it quits fer today."

Turma scowled. "I may be with child, but I'm no invalid! I'll match any pace th' rest o' you set, an fer as long, too!"

"Awright, then," said Patreese, still inwardly bristling a bit over being called "the old one" by Strack, "we'll take our rest here fer a spell, then push on long as we can 'fore the daylight fails."

"Yah," added Castor, "an' hopefully find somethin' growin' along th' trail that we can put in our stummicks!"

A short time later they were underway again, keeping to the marching order which had served them during their trek so far: Latura and Patreese up front to point the way and set the pace, followed by Strack and Castor, who bore the heaviest of their supply sacks, then Mathurin and Turma, and lastly Palter, who always seemed to lag behind no matter how leisurely a pace Latura and Patreese struck. More than one of them secretly hoped the pipsqueak of a rat might get left behind permanently.

They decided to follow the course of the stream along its banks for awhile, until it fell away alongside them and they found themselves climbing a ridge where the trees thinned out and the forest opened up around them. For the first time in many days they arrived at a spot where they could see far in every direction, their view no longer restricted to the thick woods hemming them in on all sides.

And there, at the crest of the high barren ridge, they halted, struck dumb with wonder at the sight greeting them to the northwest - right where Latura had assured them Redwall lay.

"Seven sacred seasons o' fates 'n' fur!" Castor muttered in disbelief. "It really is real!"

"Never seen naught like it," Strack breathed. "Wouldn'ta reckerned anything in th' whole world could be so tall - not even th' mountains themselves! How'd any mortal beast fashion sumpthin' like that?"

For many long moments they all just stood there in the afternoon sun, staring at the impossible red tower that seemed to scrape the clouds. Some in their village had heard of Redwall, but none had heard of Foxguard. And while that fox fortress's central spire was visible from nearly every part of Mossflower, the rats' sheltered enclave, tucked as it was in the extreme southeast of the lands along the shores of the Eastern Sea with the tall forest trees at its back, lay in a remote region beyond sight of Foxguard. Nor had any traveller or journeybeast brought word of this architectural marvel to their village in the seasons since its completion. Thus, coming face to face with such designed immensity literally took their breath away.

So enraptured were they by this spectacle that none of the others noticed how Latura shuddered at her first sight of the distant edifice.

Mathurin turned a fang-filled grin of elation toward the ratmaid. "We was right, Lattie! We was both right!"

But Latura shook her head with definite rejection. "No. Not th' tower. Not th' tower."

"Whaddya mean, Lattie?" Patreese demanded of his daughter. "That's Redwall, ain't it? That's where we're headed, right?"

Latura shook her head again. "Not th' tower," she repeated. ""Go around, go around. Da, we gotta go 'round it."

"I don't unnerstand," said Mathurin, as confused as the rest. "If that ain't Redwall, then what in th' summer blazes is it?"

"Sumpthin' we gotta go 'round," muttered Castor. "Lattie's pretty clear on that much, at least."

Strack squinted toward the distant structure. "Y'know, I deem that t' be even farther away than it seems at first glance. Several days at least, at th' rate we been hikin'. That thing is _big_. An' that means several more days outta our way 'fore we reach Redwall. That ain't gonna do our food situation any favors."

Patreese gazed down. "Well, right now we got a cliff drop an' a stream 'tween us 'n' that place anyway, so we might's well just keep goin' th' way we was."

Palter regarded the tower with hungry eyes. "Y' reckon there's food there?"

"Doutless there is," Castor replied. "Nobeast builds sumpthin' like that an' then leaves it abandoned. But won't do us any good; Lattie sez t' avoid th' place, whatever it is, so that means we avoid it."

Patrese glanced around. "Well, we don't wanna stay up here open 'n' exposed, in case there's badbeasts about. Hardly a place fer campin', neither. So, best be on our way again."

The others agreed, and presently they were winding their way along the ridge crest once more, seeking a path back down to a more sheltered spot. For a change, Strack and Castor led the way, and the usually-lagging Palter found himself walking alongside Latura. Throwing another long glance toward the phantasmagorical tower halfway to the horizon, he asked, "Why do we hafta stay away from there, Lattie? Is it a bad place?"

Latura gazed toward the tower herself, her succinct, two-word reply very nearly lost upon the gentle spring breezes.

"Not yet."

00000000000

In the deep treeshadowed gloom of the forest fringes beyond Foxguard's outer wall, the healer vixen Mona kept her rendezvous with the two mice - one alive, and one dead.

The deceased creature lay upon the forest floor wrapped in the crudest of shrouds, little more than a sheet wound haphazardly around his lifeless form; so slapdash was this affair that his tail, both footpaws and one ear protruded from gaps in the cloth.

"Do I get my food?" his living companion asked tremulously. "I did just as you asked - got 'im here nice 'n' fresh. He's not been dead long t'all."

"Yes, Flom," Mona replied, "we promised you a reward for your cooperation in this matter, and we have fulfilled our end of the agreement, just as you have."

Sappakit the swordfox and two of the fortress's weasel laborers had accompanied Mona to this spot. Now one of the weasels stepped forward, presenting Flom with a bulging haversack. The mouse wasted not a moment in snatching the sack and slinging it over his shoulder, an act which left him staggering under its weight.

"We would have happily given you even more," Mona went on, "but we didn't wish to overburden you with more than you could carry back to your home."

"That's ... that's appreciated, ma'am. This feels like plenty."

"And we would gladly have rewarded you with something more permanent if you'd preferred. We have weapons, tools, pottery and glassware, cloth, furnishings ... "

Flom shook his head. "Naw, food's what we need most. Been a long hard winter, an' that's meant lean times. River water's not enough to feed the belly."

Mona gazed down at the body, an undeniable sparkle of anticipation glittering in her eyes. "How did he die?"

"Porby never was a strong one, ma'am. Been in a bad state for over a season now, wastin' away like a beast twice his age. This past winter just drained him, took away all his strength. Not even the coming of spring could turn that around for him - he just slipped away. Don't reckon he's diseased or anything like that - his meat should still be good. Fresh, like I said."

So intent had Mona become on the prone, shrouded form at her feet that she was only half-listening to what Flom said. His inference failed to register, if she'd even caught it at all; in the Northlands, she'd often heard the term "meat" used as a euphemism to describe beats both living and dead. It could mean any number of things.

But not to Flom. As he now made perfectly plain.

"So, um, are you gonna eat him?"

Mona lifted her gaze to the inquisitive mouse, her expression as aghast as those of Sappakit and the two weasels. "I ... beg your pardon?"

"Porby here. Are you gonna eat him? You said you wanted the body fresh ... "

"Yes, but ... but not for ... I mean ... " Mona shook her head to dispel such a morbid notion. "This is Foxguard. We are forbidden from eating the flesh of other creatures."

"Forbidden? Who by?"

"Our master, Lord Urthblood."

"Is that your fox chieftain?"

"No, he's a Badger Lord of Salamandastron."

"A badger?" Flom's gaze travelled to the curved walls and soaring tower behind the foxes and weasels. "You're saying you got some kinda badger king living in there?"

"Not here," Mona explained, growing frustrated with Flom's basic ignorance over so many important matters of the lands. "Salamandastron - the great mountain fortress on the shores of the Western Sea. That's where Lord Urthblood dwells."

"Oh. So it's not like he's here to make sure you always do what he tells you to, is it?"

"Hearken to me well, Flom," Mona said, lowering herself to one knee and reaching out to place a comforting paw on his shoulder; the mouse immediately squirmed in unease at this contact, forcing Mona to awkwardly withdraw her paw.

"Listen, my friend," she pressed on, before his nerve gave out altogether and he fled into the woods with his stuffed haversack, "I am a healer. I study the remains of the dead to more fully understand how our bodies work, so that I may better minister to the sick and injured. I appreciate the sacrifice you have made in delivering your companion to us, and I vow that I will treat him with the best respect that I can manage."

Flom blinked as if being confronted with impossible information. "But, I know Porby's hardly the first deadbeast that's been brought to you. Word in nearer Mossflower's that there've been many. What do you do with 'em, if you're not eating them? Where do you put 'em?"

"I study them. Most thoroughly, inside and out. I'll spare you the details, since those can get rather, um ... "

"Bloody? Gory?"

Mona grimaced. "I was going to say unpleasant to behold, and unsettling to dwell upon, for those unaccustomed to the science."

"So you are gonna cut him up?"

Mona saw no point in dancing around the issue. With a nod, she clarified, "I did say I study my subjects inside and out. I'm afraid some dissection is unavoidable."

Flom mulled this over. "I suspect Porby'd rather of just been eaten. Seems more natural than what you're doing."

"If we were to eat your friend, he would feed our bellies for but a day. This way, he can instead feed knowledge that could help sickbeasts for generations. I'm sure he would have preferred that."

"Yeah, maybe, I guess." Flom sounded far from convinced. "So, what do you vermin sorts eat if you don't eat meat? Salads?"

"I'm partial to a hearty vegetable stew myself," Mona replied. "I'm also partial to not being called vermin, if you please."

"Oh, um, sorry."

"We also barter with some of the local otter holts for catches of fish and shrimp. I'm surprised you aren't aware of this, since you seem to know certain other things about us - such as how many bodies have been brought to me by others for my research."

"Well, we mice kinda like keeping to ourselves, ma'am."

"Nothing wrong with that, as long as you can tell the difference between rumors and reliable facts. But I will tell you this, Flom: Forget everything you've ever heard or thought you knew about foxes. We are not like them. Foxguard stands for the protection and security of Mossflower, and our last desire is to menace or dominate you. Just as Redwall has always stood as a sanctuary against dire times and wicked beasts, so shall we. So please spread the word among your fellow mice, and any other goodbeasts you encounter, that Foxguard is here for all of you. If you should ever have need of a healer, my talents are yours for the asking. If you should ever lack food for famine, water for drought, or shelter from winter's bitter chill, our gate is open to - "

"Mona," Sappakit interrupted, stepping forward; the dogfox's neat black uniform tunic projected an altogether different level of martial authority than the vixen's pastel blouse and skirt, or the earthy browns and grays of the weasels' more utilitarian garb, and his manner now was equally taciturn. The sword sheathed at his waist only added to his soldierly aspect.

"Foxguard is a military garrison," he intoned, "not an infirmary for all of Mossflower. Nor are we the larder for these woodlands, or a tavern for all the forest's creatures. Tolar would not appreciate you extending offers we might not be able to fulfill."

"I'm sure Tolar, as our commander, would appreciate the strategic wisdom of not alienating the local residents," Mona sharply countered. "We may be a military garrison, but we are not currently at war with anybeast. And if the tides of war should someday wash over us and break upon our walls, I am certain our Sword would much rather have forged strong and stalwart allies from beasts like Flom, instead of having them hide in their holes while the storm of battle rages around them."

Sappakit allowed himself a half-smirk. "I would hardly begin to deny that you are in a much better position to know the mind of our Sword than I, m'lady."

Flom, as tremulous as he'd been already, found this display of open dissent between the two foxes too much to take. "Um, er, I'll just be off now ... " And with that, he broke for the deep woods.

Mona stood. "Flom!"

Her commanding tone halted the fleeing mouse in his tracks. He stood uncertainly, gazing back over his shoulder to await whatever warning or reprimand the vixen was about to issue him. To his surprise, he saw her favoring him with a look of beatific sympathy on her delicate features.

"I'm sorry about your friend. About Porby."

"Er ... thankee, ma'am. Thanks much." Flom resumed his withdrawal, and within moments had vanished down the overgrown forest path.

"Strong and stalwart allies, you said?" Sappakit teased Mona. "If all the woodlanders around here are like that one, I doubt they'll be standing at our side in battle any season soon."

Mona scowled. "We have got to do a better job of winning the hearts and minds of the local population, or else the whole point of Foxguard will become moot."

"I'll suggest a campaign of fruit baskets and floral garlands to Tolar," Sappakit said. "Although to be honest, Mona, your habit of soliciting the corpses of these folk's loved ones can't be advancing our cause any."

"They'll thank me if a plague ever breaks out, or some other calamity drives them to our gate in need of my healer's skills."

"Maybe. But for now, let's just get out of here. This place gives me the creeps."

Mona glanced around them, surprised. "Oh, it's not that gloomy here. We're right at the forest's edge - why, the sun's shining brightly not a dozen paces from us."

"You weren't here four seasons ago, so it's easy for you to forget, but this is almost the exact spot from which Snoga launched his murderous sneak attack against us while Foxguard was still under construction and we were ill prepared to meet any such assault - and assault and siege which, I need hardly remind you, claimed the life of our previous Sword Andrus, and robbed Redwall's Abbess of her senses."

"Oh. I hadn't realized. Well, let's get Porby inside, then - I'd like to start preparing him before decomposition sets in."

The two weasels each took one end of the deceased mouse's wrapped form and bore him away toward Foxguard's one and only entrance tunnel under the outer wall, which faced the River Moss to the south. A thought occurred to Mona as she followed, watching the laborers struggling with their burden.

"He seems quite a pawful, even for two burly weasels. However did Flom manage to bear his friend here to us all by himself?"

"He didn't," Sappakit stated simply from alongside her as they stepped forth from the forest shadows into full sunlight. "I noticed the pawprints of several other creatures on the ground there. They must have helped Flom carry the body to our rendezvous spot, then retreated before we arrived on the scene. Wouldn't surprise me if they were hiding a short distance away, watching everything through the trees."

Mona shook her head sadly. "Do they really fear and distrust us that much?"

"Flom was half-convinced that we meant to eat his friend. What would _you_ think of creatures you suspected were capable of doing such a thing?"


	4. Chapter 3

**CHAPTER THREE**

Against the backdrop of the budding orchard, the sound of hammering filled the grounds of Redwall Abbey.

Geoff, normally predisposed to steer clear of such scenes of din and racket, felt it his Abbotly duty to at least look in on the progress of the festival stage. To his surprise, he found Brother Sethburr, the Abbey's chief carpenter, standing well back from the construction zone with paws on his hips, overseeing the project while a veritable swarm of shrews busied themselves with plank, hammer and nail.

"How goes it, Seth?" Geoff inquired.

The grizzled older mouse - a familiar sight around Redwall with his distinctive tufts of fur protruding from ears and cheeks - shook his head in amazement. "You know I've always prided myself in being about as paws-on a beast as ever there was, Abbot, but these little bundles of energy are putting me to shame! With them on the job, this task which might have taken days is looking to be completed in a single afternoon."

Geoff took in the rays of the lower sun reflecting off the upper reaches of the dusky walltop, casting the grounds around them in a rosy springtime glow. "Well, this afternoon is nearing its end, but you're right: that stage does look to be nearly finished."

And so it did. The main support scaffolding was entirely erected, as were the wood steps leading from the lawns up to either side of the raised platform. (Browder had insisted upon the twin sets of stairs, to facilitate smoother and more rapid entrances and exits of the youthful players - as if this presentation were going to be any sort of professional production.) And over half of the top crossplanks, the stage boards upon which these budding thespians would tread, had already been hammered into place as well. All that would remain after that would be the curtains and cloth bunting and other fabric accouterments, which would fall to Sister Gretchen rather than Seth and his army of worker shrews.

A sudden gruff yelp, followed by a brief string of invective of a sort seldom heard within the Abbey's walls, indicated where one of the Guosim had exercised less than perfect aim with his hammer.

"Of course," Sethburr added with a smirk, "such formidable progress comes at the cost of a few pawthumbs!"

The shrew in question knelt upon the unfinished stage, sucking at his tender paw when he noticed Sethburr and Geoff looking on. Blushing about his ears, he said, "Oh, er, sorry, Abbot. Didn't realize you were standin' right there."

"Better me than some of our more impressionable residents of tender seasons, with a mouth like that," Geoff retorted, although not without a trace of good humor. "Please do try to watch your language, at least as long as you're at Redwall."

"Yessir, Abbot sir!'

"An' you'd best head up to th' Infirmary t' get that looked at," Log-a-Log added from stage right, where he was overseeing his work crew. "Don't worry 'bout leavin' us shortpawed - we got plenty o' volunteers t' step in an' take yer place!"

Indeed, even as the bruised and smarting shrew hopped down from the stage and headed for the main Abbey building to have his wound tended to, another of the Guosim waiting nearby climbed up to take his place, hammer in paw so quickly that the work suffered hardly any interruption at all.

Log-a-Log himself jumped down to join the two mice. "We'll 'ave this timber tomfoolery ready fer its young stars in just a few more shakes. So, when d'you reckon showtime'll be?"

"Oh, not until the day after tomorrow, at the earliest," Geoff told the shrew chieftain. "Our actors are still learning their lines - and regretting the day Winokur and I decided to bring in Browder to coach them!"

"Ah - speakin' of tomfoolery, I hope that harebrain ain't puttin' too much on Pirkko."

"Oh, Browder's putting all the students through their paces, there's no denying that," said Geoff. "He's all but appointed himself stage director for this pageant! Although I daresay his bluster only gets him so far with our more willful young ones; I imagine Droge and Budsock will give that hare a few more gray hairs before this is all over!"

"I imagine my Pirkko's not takin' any grief from that blusterbunny neither. He's no shrinkin' violet, my son ain't! Never shy 'bout bein' th' center of attention, or comin' up with tales or songs. Why, t'wouldn't surprise me one whit if he makes up most o' his lines right on th' spot come showtime, improvisin' his way through th' whole thing!"

Geoff's brow furrowed. "I should certainly hope it doesn't come to _that_. Winokur and I did put a lot of work into composing those historical vignettes, after all. Now, if you gentlebeasts will excuse me, all that hammering's getting to be a bit much for these ears of mine. I can see everything here's in good paws, so I'll just leave the two of you to it. Perhaps I'll look in on the kitchens to see how Friar Hugh's coming along with supper."

"Yes, ye best be off, then," Log-a-Log cheerfully agreed. ""Last thing we need's an Abbot with a headache!"

As he headed across the lawns toward the main Abbey, from which wafted the first tantalizing aromas of the evening meal, Geoff spotted Lekkas coming toward him from the gatehouse, on a path to intercept the Abbot. The strapping mouse, adorned in his usual neat shirt and open black vest, strode with the square-shouldered, chest-out assurance he'd adopted since leaving behind his wretched existence as a searat slave and settling at Redwall. In his paw Lekkas clutched a large sheet of parchment that flapped in time with his confident stride. As he approached, he held the parchment forth. "Father Abbot, if you have a moment ... "

Geoff sighed, knowing full well what Lekkas likely wanted to discuss. "I was just on my way to the kitchens, but feel free to walk with me if you like."

"Thank you, I will at that." Lekkas fell into step alongside Geoff, adjusting his gait to match that of the less robust mouse. "I've just been going over the latest rough schematics with Foremole, and I think we've made some improvements, if I do say so myself. I thought you'd like to see them."

Geoff paused at the bottom of the steps leading up into Great Hall. "I appreciate your enthusiasm for this proposal, my friend, I really do - and seemingly boundless it is - but you do realize that this may all be a bit premature, don't you? We haven't even committed to building it yet, after all."

Lekkas regarded Geoff with a measure of frustrated impatience. "With all due respect, Abbot, we should be long past deciding whether or not to commit to this, and focused instead on just HOW we're going to build it."

"We don't even know if it will be needed, at this point," Geoff said. "The flood of freed slaves we've long anticipated has yet to appear, and I'm beginning to wonder if it ever will."

"If we wait until they're massed at our gates, it will be too late," Lekkas countered. "And even if we don't see additional refugees in the numbers we were led to expect, it's already more crowded at Redwall than it ought to be. We must proceed with this, and soon."

Geoff exhaled and took the plans to study them as they talked. "Hmm ... I see you've expanded the designs further. You realize we'll have to reopen the quarry for this, and in a major way, too."

"We would have had to do so in any case, no matter which solution we chose."

"I wonder how Tolar would feel about that ... "

"What does that matter? Foxguard has been completed since last fall. They have no further need of that sandstone, unless they're planning major additions we've not been told about."

Geoff gave a snort. "Given their history, and that of anything to do with Lord Urthblood in general, that wouldn't come as any great surprise."

"It's irrelevant anyway. That quarry is an open resource, available to all. It gave up the stone to build Redwall long before Foxguard was ever conceived. It's as much ours as anybeast else's."

"I'll not argue that." Geoff shook his head. "I just don't know. Sometimes I think, if we're going to reopen the quarry at all, we should make our first order of business those stairs up to Warbeak Loft. We've certainly been talking about doing that for enough seasons now."

"Beasts can't sleep on a staircase, Abbot."

"Oh, they could - they just wouldn't be very comfortable." Into the awkward pause that followed, Geoff stared over the top of his spectacles at Lekkas. "That was a joke. Contrary to popular belief and prevailing opinion, I'm not a total fussbottom!"

Lekkas cracked a smile. "So it appears. But we must go ahead with this, and soon. We really have no other choice."

Geoff regarded the plans anew. "It just seems so ... ambitious."

"No moreso than adding an entire new dormitory wing, which was the other option we were seriously considering. It certainly would not disrupt Abbey routine as much as that would have."

"That's true," Geoff admitted. "Not to mention that any new substantial construction inside our walls would reduce our lawn and garden areas, and I'd be loathe to do that to any great degree."

"Then we're agreed in principle that this is the only viable alternative." Lekkas took the plans back from Geoff, carefully rolling the parchment into a scroll. "And we'll have all the willing paws for this task we could ever want. Earlier today I was speaking with Log-a-Log, and he is willing to delay the Guosim's summer wanderings in order to help us at the quarry. With Foremole to direct our labors and the entire Guosim at our disposal to assist with the cutting and excavating of the stone, we'll have all we'll need in very short order!"

Geoff frowned. "Funny - I was just over there speaking with Log-a-Log myself, and this is news to me. Odd that he didn't mention such a major change in his tribe's travel plans for the warmer seasons."

Lekkas gestured toward the rising stage, from which the incessant pounding of hammers still came. "Well, he is rather occupied with his current work. Shall I go fetch him so we can discuss this further?"

Geoff held up his paw. "Not just now, if you don't mind. It's almost suppertime, and my mind's more on food and drink than deliberation just at the moment. Tonight after dinner, or perhaps tomorrow, we can convene an informal council of all the Abbey leaders, so that the full merits of your proposal can be discussed in detail. Now that it looks like we'll be going ahead with it, we'd best make sure we do it right!"

"I'm glad to see you're finally coming around to my way of thinking on this, Abbot. It really is the sensible course of action to take." Lekkas noticed an appraising look in Geoff's expressing that hadn't been there a moment before, and realized the other mouse now regarded him with a newly assessing gaze. "What is it?" he asked, genuinely puzzled.

"I was just remembering when you came to us last spring with your fellow slaves, and how all of us comfortable, healthy and well-fed Redwallers greeted you as half-wasted refugees. But even back then, you had a commanding quality to you, a definite take-charge attitude. You've filled out physically in the seasons since, so that the solidness of your frame now matches the spirit within. You've come a long way from that wayward soul we took in four seasons ago. And to think, if this idea of yours keeps building momentum the way it is, we may all soon be addressing you as mayor!"

Lekkas's eyes widened in surprise at this declaration. "What? But ... no, that's ... that's not why I'm doing this!"

"Perhaps not. But that's often the way of things. Fate chooses you, and when it does, there's nothing to do but go along with it." Geoff turned and started up the stone steps. "Rather like when I became Abbot ... "

Lekkas stood immobile for several moments, caught off guard by these implications, then hurried up the steps after Geoff. Falling into step alongside the Abbot as they passed into Great Hall with its sandstone columns and majestic stained glass windows high up the walls, he said, "You must understand, this has never been about any personal ambition or self aggrandizement on my part. I'm simply doing what needs to be done. It's not about me at all."

Geoff smiled at these flustered attempts at self-deprecation. "Lekkas, your strength of purpose clearly shows you to be a natural-born leader. Winokur and I have long fancied that you might someday become one of Redwall's chief defenders, even if you didn't take up the sword of Martin, but I am beginning to suspect destiny has chosen a different role for you, although one no less important. You have championed this cause of yours with unflagging spirit, and if there's one thing we know about here at this Abbey - " Geoff waved a paw toward the ornate tapestry hanging across Great Hall from them, the image of Redwall's founder Martin the Warrior boldly embroidered upon it. " - well, it's champions! Everybeast here looks up to you, most of all your fellow former slaves. They see you as their spokesbeast and advocate for whatever needs doing. It's only natural that they might wish to formalize what we all recognize anyway. So, if you're destined to serve in such a position, well, it would hardly be gracious to decline, would it?"

"Well, when you put it like _that_ ... "

"Now, let's go see what Friar Hugh is whipping up, shall we? It already smells quite delicious!"

Lekkas followed along, mulling over everything Geoff had just said. _Mayor?_ Actually, that did have a nice ring, now that he thought about it.

00000000000

Metellus sat staring at the dried leaves arrayed upon the desktop before him, visually dissecting them with the kind of rapt focus that only an adolescent badger could muster.

"Take your time," old Arlyn encouraged him. "This test is a tricky one."

Novice healer and retired Abbot sat alone in Redwall's Infirmary, the last rays of the afternoon sun slanting through the sick bay's west windows to shine upon the herbal display like a spotlight. Arlyn and Metellus had the large room to themselves, as they so often did now that winter was over; with the prevalent chills and fevers of that season now gladly relegated to memory, every bed lay empty as Redwall welcomed the improved health so often ushered in by the warmer weather.

The young badger, having felt he'd studied the herbs as much as would benefit him, extended a downward-pointing paw over each one in turn as he named them.

"Horehound ... Valerian ... Burdock ... Feverfew ... Comfrey ... Pasque ... Coltsfoot ... Hawthorn ... Yarrow ... Bogbean ... Vervain ... Meadowsweet ... and Foxglove."

Arlyn's eyes widened in admiration, and the elderly mouse beamed at his student. "That was excellent! You correctly named them all! And no easy feat, either, since these are dried specimens, and their shriveled, water-deprived state makes the leaves that much harder to identify. I know I've said it before, but it bears repeating that a large part of a healer's responsibilities includes gathering and harvesting the herbs and roots and flowers and bark and berries needed to make whatever potions and poultices and salves are called for. And not all of them are to be found growing within our walls, not by any measure; many will need to be collected from the woods and meadows. Any healerbeast worth its salt must know the names, appearance and properties of a host of plants both wild and cultivated. Now, let's review what ailments each of these herbs remedies ... "

Metellus began his recitation, again pointing to each sample as he named it. "Horehound, for coughs. Valerian helps beasts sleep. Burdock purifies the blood and helps heal burns ... " An uncharacteristic roguish smile came to the badger's lips as he looked up at Arlyn. "It also makes you pee!"

Arlyn couldn't help but return the grin, sharing in the impish moment. "Yes, it can have that effect. And it's times like this that I can tell you're good friends with Budsock, since that's the kind of detail he'd glory in. Please try not to be quite so crass when you get to the Meadowsweet. Now, do go on ..."

"Coltsfoot, for colds, coughs, and congestion - the 'three c's.' Feverfew, for fevers, of course - that's rather obvious, isn't it? - but also headaches, joint pains and stomach problems. Hawthorn, for ailments of the heart and kidneys. Comfrey helps knit bone fractures and relieve back pains, but is also good for burns. Pasque, for - "

"Wait a moment," Arlyn cut in. "I've never heard of using comfrey for burns."

"It was in Abbot Cedric's journals," Metellus stated simply. "Brother Winokur gave that to me for my studies. According to Cedric, it was quite effective."

"Hmm. Then I guess it's a good thing you're to be our next Infirmary keeper, because you're telling me things I either never knew or have just plain forgotten!"

Further recitation by Metellus was forestalled by the appearance just then of a diminutive figure at the far door to the sick bay. Arlyn and his apprentice both turned to take in their visitor. A Guosim shrew sauntered into the room and strode toward them, up the aisle formed by the rows of empty beds against either wall. Mouse and badger couldn't help but notice how the newcomer clutched at his paw.

"Don't tell me," Arlyn wryly inquired. "Hammered paw?"

"Ho, how'd ya guess?"

"You're only the third one we've had in here today ... or is it four? You shrews need to pay more attention to where you place your paws when you're driving those nails!"

The shrew let slip a grin of chagrin as he settled himself down on the edge of the nearest bed. "Heh, yeah, I guess we do, don't we?"

"Well, no matter - we've certainly gained enough experience in how to deal with such cases!" Arlyn looked to Metellus. "In fact, I'd say it's time my apprentice here takes charge of a patient for himself. Metellus, how would you treat such an injury?"

The shrew fidgeted a bit, clutching at his swollen paw anew with visible misgivings. "Um, are y' sure he's able t' handle this? 'Ee's still pretty young ... "

"Oh, nonsense! Metellus has been training under me for over two seasons now, and this is just a slight contusion. It's not like he'll be setting a broken bone or anything so challenging."

"Actually, Abbot," the young badger said, rising from his chair, "we really should rule that out before anything else. If Klugo has a fracture, we don't want to risk just sending him away with a mere bruise remedy."

"Hm. Yes, that's actually very good thinking, Metty. Although I doubt our friend here is likely to have smashed his paw so thoroughly that he's broken any bones, it's always best to eliminate the worst before proceeding."

Metellus knelt before Klugo, gingerly probing the distressed area with patient and careful pawtips; even on one knee, the adolescent badger was nearly as tall as the seated adult shrew. To distract himself from his discomfort, Klugo said, "Impressed you knew my name, son. Sometimes it seems most Redwallers can't even tell us Guosim apart!"

"Well, there certainly are a lot of you, that can't be denied," Arlyn admitted from over his student's shoulder, where he'd positioned himself to oversee the examination. "And I confess that I myself never seem able to learn or remember even half your names between the time you arrive in autumn and the time you leave us again in the spring. Just how did you recall Klugo's name, Metellus?"

"Geoff always made a point of entering the name of every member of the wintering Guosim into the Abbey records, and Brother Winokur does it too, now that he's our Recorder."

"Yes, but, that still doesn't explain how _you_ were able to remember ... "

"Sometimes I run out of medical journals to read," Metellus explained, "so then I turn to the recent histories."

"Even so, there's a big difference between memorizing lists of names, and being able to put faces to them."

The badger shrugged. "I guess I just pay attention to such things. I'm not feeling anything that feels like a break, Abbot, but you might want to double-check it yourself, to make certain I didn't miss something."

"A wise precaution ... but then, I've come to expect wisdom from you as a matter of course." Arlyn leaned in to make his own inspection as Metellus stepped aside, and the old mouse quickly confirmed his pupil's prognosis. "No breaks that I can find either. Must just be bad bruising and swelling. So, what would you prescribe as treatment?"

Metellus barely needed to think it over. "A firm wrapping of comfrey and vervain, bound by a dockleaf poultice."

"Yes, that would have been my own recommendation exactly. Now let's see how good you are at working with an actual dressing instead of dried samples!"

Klugo sat at ease while Metellus prepared the poultice wrap under his mentor's watchful eye; now that the shrew had seen how much stock Arlyn placed in his pupil's budding skills, he was not nearly so hesitant about allowing the badger to minister to him.

"Looks like Redwall's healin' needs'll be in good paws after all, from what I'm seein' here, an' fer many seasons to come, too."

"Yes," Arlyn agreed with a nod, "Metellus is a most accomplished student, and since badgers tend to live so much longer than most other creatures, he may well be serving Redwall's needs in this capacity many, many seasons after the rest of us have left this world. We've never had a badger Infirmary keeper before, only Badger Mothers like Maura for our little ones, so it should be most interesting to see how it works out."

Metellus glanced up from his bandaging duties to look at Arlyn with a melancholy expression. "But, given what you just said about the long lives of my kind, that means you won't be around to see how it works out."

Arlyn gave a gentle old laugh. "My son, I'm afraid there are a great many things I won't get to see. There were times this past winter when I seriously worried whether I would even get to see this marvelous spring we're enjoying. The coldest season can be hard indeed on old bones like mine. Thanks the fates for yarrow and feverfew!"

"Ain't this turned inta a bright an' cheery conversation," Klugo muttered as he sat having his bandage applied.

"Not to worry, either of you," Arlyn assured them. "I plan to stick around a few more seasons if I have anything to say about it. Springtime in Mossflower is too glorious to miss, and lazy summers hold some of my favorite memories, as do the crisp days of autumn. I suspect I have many more lessons to impart to my eager young protege here!"

"I do hope so, Abbot," Metellus said, "although I do learn a lot from Mona as well. I'm looking forward to paying another visit to Foxguard as soon as I may."

"Yes, you do seem to both enjoy and benefit from your tutelage under her, don't you? Personally, I have always found her approach a touch too ... radical for my sensibilities, not to mention a tad unsettling, but I suppose her methodology is not without its merits. Perhaps merging Redwallian and Foxguard healing practices might just allow you to someday become the most accomplished healer this Abbey has ever known!"

"I would very much like that to be the case, Abbot."

"Well, I would advise you delay any further trips to Foxguard until at least after the Guosim leave us; that will give us roughly two hundred fewer potential patients here to worry about!"

Metellus applied the finishing touches to his work, examining his efforts with an appraising eye. "I think this should do it, but could you please look it over for me, Abbot?"

Klugo tried to flex his wrapped digits but found them too heavily immobilized by the tight dressing. "Hey! How'm I s'posed to hold a hammer like this?!"

Arlyn smiled as he evaluated their patient. "I'd say your hammering days are over, my friend - at least for the next few days. My apprentice has tended your wound exactly as I would have, and no doubt with a surer paw, too. You'll just have to let the other hundred and ninety-nine Guosim at Redwall finish building that stage without you!"


	5. Chapter 4

**CHAPTER FOUR**

The day after first sighting the mystery tower, Latura's party pushed north through Mossflower Woods, the rosy spire never lost to their vision for long.

Sometimes, when their unmapped course took them under the dense springtime forest canopy, the fantastic edifice was blocked from view. But then, with every break in the trees or rise in the terrain, there it would be again, an unmistakable signpost of impossible proportions, pointing them to where they wanted to be ... and where they didn't. And so, as another hungry day wore away one pawstep at a time, the distant tower slowly slipped below them on their left, falling away to the south as the travellers undertook their tedious detour around it.

The food situation was no better than before, and if anything worse, since they'd dipped into their diminishing provisions to take their meagre breakfast without replenishing their haversacks to make up for it in any way. The nights too still held a bitter tinge of the winter just passed to contrast the warming, milder days, forcing them all to huddle shivering under their travel blankets as their campfire died down to embers after each spare supper. They woke in the mornings cold and hungry, and if they had scant little to fill their bellies, they could at least work off their aching chill by setting out as soon as dawn gave enough light to see them along the forest paths.

Castor glanced at the red tower as the seven rats tromped through an open glade. "Reckon we'll ever find out what that thing is?"

"They'll know at Redwall," Mathurin stated with absolute certitude. "No way anybeast puts up sumpthin' like that, without Redwall bein' in th' know about it."

"Do y' s'pose th' Redwall beasties built it themselves?" Strack wondered.

"Don't see how that could be," said Castor. "Lattie's made it pretty plain we gotta steer clear o' that place, an' I don't see why she woulda warned us away from it if'n it had anything t' do with where we're goin'."

"I'm almost ready t' say to Hellsgates with Lattie's words o' caution an' head fer it m'self," Strack said. "At least we'd know there'd likely be food there."

"Now ye're startin' t' sound like Palter," Castor teased the big rat.

Strack scowled. "Fates ferbid!"

Turma, walking at her husband Mathurin's side, couldn't hide a smirk herself at Strack's voiced lack of faith in Latura. "An' here I thought you was liddle Miss Emptyhead's champion. Is an empty belly changin' yer mind 'bout whether we still oughtta be followin' her?"

Strack shot the pregnant ratwife an irate glare, shifting the pack on his shoulders. "I don't exactly see you runnin' off t' fend fer yerself ... "

"That's 'cos my starry-eyed husband here's so full o' hopes 'n' dreams 'bout this Redwall place, I doubt a badger could keep 'im from this fool's errand. But where would I run to, even if I wanted to? Where would any of us go? We're in strange, unfamiliar territory now, all our other family an' neighbors half a season's march behind us by the Eastern Sea, an' the possibility o' enemies lurkin' behind every tree an' around every bend in th' forest trail - when there even is any trail. We gotta stick t'gether now, even to th' death, 'cos each other's all we got!"

The others digested Turma's words, recognizing the truth of them. They might be travel-weary and half-starved, but they'd embarked on this journey together, and even if some occasional sniping and bickering between them could fray nerves and raise tensions, they all realized on some level that they all wanted and sought the same thing, and until they reached their goal - or were stopped from doing so - their greatest strength lay in each other.

Castor picked up on Turma's line of thinking. "Leastways, if there's been one silver linin' to this excursion so far, it's that we ain't run inta any thieves or villains, lookin' t' slay or rob or enslave us. Movin' along in a group like this has prob'ly spared us any harassment from nastybeasts."

"Oh, really?" Strack countered. "That one otter holt we ran inta was about as nasty towards us as any vermin woulda been. I wager half of 'em was itchin' fer any excuse to put their javelins right through us - even Patty an' our females. T'weren't very gracious 'bout tellin' us t' move on."

"Or very subtle 'bout lettin' us know how unwelcome we were neither," Mathurin agreed, "as if we'd wanna settle down near a tribe o' such rude 'n' hostile streamdogs when we're on our way to Redwall!"

"Yeah, th' way they was actin', you woulda thought _we_ were th' vermin!" added Castor.

"Not that anybeast else's been any more helpful or accommodatin' to us," said Strack. "Ev'ry mouse an' hedgehog homestead we've passed has bolted its doors an' shuttered its windows when they see us comin', an' ev'ry squirrel who spots us turns its bushy tail an' flees inta th' trees! It's like - "

"Flees inta th' trees!" Latura giggled. "That rhymes!"

"Erhrm. As I were sayin', 'tis like th' mere sight o' seven simple ratfolk on an honest journey is enuff t' give 'em all frights!"

"Well," Mathurin mused, "mebbe t' them, we _are_ vermin ... "

"Pah!" Strack scoffed. "I'm about as verminous as a mousebabe, so what does that make Lattie, or Patty, or Palter?"

"I'm just sayin', is all. That's th' way they see us. Not sayin' it's right, or even that it makes sense. Mebbe they ain't accustermed t' havin' rats hereabouts ... "

"Or mebbe th' wrong kind o' rats," put in Castor. "Somebeasts're just brutes 'n' bullies, and it only takes a run-in with one t' sour yer whole attitude toward a whole species."

"Hey, it ain't like we're foxes, or anything like that," Strack protested. "I could see honest creatures shunnin' those sorts. Only a fool'd trust those connivin' scoundrels."

"With our luck," Turma sniffed, "these Redwall folks might feel th' same way 'bout us as all the woodlanders we been seein'. After trudgin' halfway 'cross Mossflower t' make our way there, who's t' say they won't just slam their gates in our faces, an' tell us we ain't welcome there, just 'cos we're rats?"

This silenced all of them as they considered this horrendous possibility.

"Naw," Castor said at last. "That ain't gonna happen."

Strack turned a jaundiced eye toward Castor. "What, you catchin' some o' Mathurin's optermism alla sudden?"

"'Course he is," Mathurin said. "Redwallers would never spurn weary travellers like that, or turn us away just 'cos of our species."

"You so sure o' that?" Strack challenged. "Ain't any of us ever been there, nor anybeast any of us've ever known. Fur, none of us even woulda known how t' get there, if Lattie 'ere wasn't guidin' us. How do we know what they're gonna do when we get there? Mebbe Turma's right, an' they'll act as frosty toward us as any otter or mouse or squirrel we've met so far ... "

"Ain't gonna happen," Castor repeated. "An' I ain't sayin' that outta optermism or naught like that. Lattie's tellin' us t' go there, an' she'd not be doin' that if Redwall ain't where we're meant to be goin'. Simple as that."

"Simple," Strack snorted. "Yeah, she is that, awright." He turned to Patreese. "An' what about you, Patty? You deem yer daughter's leadin' us on th' straight 'n' narrow?"

"Aye, I do," the rat patriarch answered with an emphatic, unhesitating nod. "An' if you'da been there too when she spoke in that voice that t'weren't her own, you'd not have any doubts neither. Dunno what's waitin' fer us at Redwall, or how much longer it'll take t' reach it, or what further trials 'n' strife we might hit up against 'fore we get there, but it's where we're meant to be. I'm sure of it."

"Well, that makes one o' us," Strack muttered. "Least we was able t' scrounge up some old acorns 'long th' path back there, even if they was th' dregs picked over an' rejected by th' squirrels in these parts. Hopefully if we roast 'em fer a spell over our campfire t'night, it'll cook out any rot that's in 'em an' soften 'em up enuff so they won't break our teeth when we try'n eat 'em."

"Anything t' put in our gullet's better'n nuthin'," said Castor. "Ain't like we - "

And then the thing happened which had not happened to them so far during their journeys, the thing they'd all hoped to avoid until they'd reached the sanctuary of Redwall. There on the path before them, standing perfectly still even though they seemed to have materialized from the forest gloom out of nowhere, loitered a stoat and a ferret, blocking the trail with lazily nonchalant poses clearly calculated to convey a bullying menace.

Both rested their paws on the hilts of the swords they wore at their sides.

"Hey, Yunk, lookit what we got 'ere! Looks like th' wind's blowin' some rabble through th' woods!"

"Yeah," the stoat agreed. "Sorry lookin' bunch, ain't they?"

Patreese, who'd been marching at the head of the rat vanguard with Latura, said, "We're just passin' through, friends. We don't want no trouble."

"Too late fer that ... friend," the ferret responded. "If y' didn't want trouble, you ought not to've been trespassin' in our woods."

"Yer woods?" Strack stepped forward, muscles bunching under his shirt in a bold display. "Don't reckon these woodlands belong t' you any more'n they belong t' us, so what say you two just step aside an' let us be on our way?"

The semblance of whatever feigned smiles the two ruffians had been putting on now vanished into cold glares. "Ain't gonna happen," said the stoat Yunk.

Latura's party contained no trained fighters, and no weapons more formidable than the knives they used for cooking. Despite this, Strack refused to back down. "In case y' ain't noterced, we outnumber you seven t' two. Now, 're you gonna step aside, or am I gonna hafta make you move?" He started to shrug his pack off his back, making it clear that, with his obvious brawn, he'd be able to brandish it as an effective bludgeon to counter any blade brought to bear against him.

The ferret gave a sharp, piercing whistle between his clenched fangs. Instantly, two arrows thudded into the ground near Strack's feet.

"Never said we was alone, now did we?" the ferret taunted with a grin of pure malice.

Strack studied the arrows embedded in the path, realizing full well that they just as easily could have been put in his chest instead, and shrugged his pack fully back into position across his shoulder. Seven against two they might have been able to handle, but now they knew the enemy numbered at least four, and included capable bowbeasts among them. Latura and Palter would be just about useless in any kind of real fight, while Patreese was too advanced in seasons to intimidate anybeast and Turma was with child. Which left only Strack, Castor and Mathurin ... none of whom possessed any actual battle training. If they were going to get out of this at all, it wouldn't be by fighting.

"Okay, so we ain't gonna fight you," Strack conceded. "Whaddya want?"

"We want you, is what we want," the ferret answered with a sneer. "Our Lord's roundin' up beasts like you t' put 'em t' work fer 'im, an' I reckon th' lot o' you oughtta make 'im happy." He paused to assess the seven rats more thoroughly. "Or some o' you will, anyways. Hey, Yunk, think we should take 'em all back with us, or slay th' ladyfolk 'n' weaklings an' leave 'em to the ants?"

Yunk the stoat guffawed. "Naw, th' ants'd be mad at us fer leavin' th' likes o' these wretches! 'Sidesways, Emp'ror Krayne allers likes t' decide fer 'imself which beasts 'ee c'n use, an' which're ripe fer slayin'. We gotta take 'em all, even if it's more'n they're worth!"

As the accosted travellers fidgeted nervously at this cold assessment of their fate, carried on right in front of them as if they weren't even there, the two bowbeasts emerged from the trees, new arrows nocked to their bowstrings as they stepped forward to stand alongside the ferret and stoat. Both were rats.

Latura gazed at them. "They're in danger too," she observed, as casually as if she were commenting on the pleasant weather.

Patresse looked to his daughter. "Lattie, whadda we do?" he implored, as if any choice in the matter remained to them. "Ya gotta tell us ... "

Latura seemed oblivious to the fact that any menace lay close at paw. "We keep goin', Da."

"But, what does that mean?" Patreese glanced from Latura to the brigands; was she suggesting they push on through by force, regardless of the dire threat confronting them, or cooperate and go peacefully with their would-be abductors?

Latura turned her gaze to her father, her placid eyes filled with unworried calm. "It'll be okay, Da."

This was all Patreese needed to hear. Leveling his own gaze at the stoat and ferret, he squared his shoulders and declared, "Ye'll get no trouble from us. Lead on, t' wherever y' want us t' go."

The two vermin seemed momentarily confused by the scattershot hierarchy of authority displayed by this group of raggedy travellers - how the oldest among them had smoothly taken charge from the burly rat who'd spoiled for a fight, but had then deferred to the unassuming female who came across as the weakest of their band - but the ferret and stoat quickly reasserted their command over the situation.

"Wise choice," the ferret said. "Now, fall inta line after us, an' if ye don't want yer blood stainin' this forest path, you'll not set one claw outside where we tells ya, unnerstand?"

As they fell into dejected step behind their new leaders, with the pair of archer rats bringing up the rear, they could hear stoat and ferret continue to ruminate on what was to become of them.

"Reckon we'll find any use fer this sorry lot?"

"Mebbe. Emp'ror Krayne'll know what to do with 'em."

"Aye, that 'ee will, I wager. An' if 'ee don't, then Joska will!"

00000000000

"The sea, o hi, the sea!

The sea along the shore

Brother Sea, fine -

"Oh, hullo, Cyril!"

Cyril rolled his eyes and tried to make himself smaller - no easy feat, since he already knelt upon the ground. "Oh, brother, not again!" he muttered.

Vanessa came skipping merrily across the lawns to where Cyril and his weasel companion Smallert were engaged in their labors. "Hiya, Cyr!" she half-shouted as she flounced up to them.

"Hi, Nessa," the young mouse groaned in return.

"Whatcha doin'? Looks like fun!"

"You always say that no matter what I'm doing. But it just so happens that today Smallert and I are helping Balla with some of her old empty barrels and casks that need to be retooled. We're quite busy, so why don't you just go find something else to occupy yourself?"

"Busy, huh?" This seemed to fill the stricken former Abbess - still reduced to a carefree juvenile state by her head trauma suffered at Foxguard the previous spring - with unbridled glee. "Well, then let me help!"

Cyril looked at her askance as she lifted the hem of her floral dress and plopped down onto the grass alongside him. "Why is it that whenever you offer to help me with anything, it always ends up with you kissing me?"

"Well, what red-blooded mousemaid could resist a peck on the cheek from such a dashing and handsome malebeast as you?" she playfully responded as she idly caressed his tail, causing him to flick it away. Smallert grinned at their coy interplay, as he usually did, but held his silence.

"You've gone beyond a peck a few times!" Cyril accused, which elicited a stifled snigger from the one-eared weasel. "But anyway, this is work for exactly two beasts - no more, no less - so you can't help!"

Smallert nodded in agreement. "Aye, 'tis true 'nuff, Nessa. Just enuff here t' keep four paws occupied, an' no more'n that."

Vanessa pouted for all of half a moment, then snapped back to her cheerful, ebullient self. "That's okay!" she said, snuggling up to Cyril. "I'll just sit here and watch!"

Cyril scuttled aside, causing Vanessa to fall over when she suddenly no longer had him to lean on. "No, you won't! We're busy here, and you can't be in our way! Why can't you just go ... be with beasts your own age?"

Vanessa rolled over onto her back, gazing up at the blue morning sky. "My own age? Brother Wink doesn't want me in his classes anymore, and that's where they all are this time of day. Mister Rudderpuppy says I'm too disruptive, but I don't think he knows what he's talking about - Buddy and Drogey are far more disruptive than I ever was!"

"Whatever you say. Why don't you go find Mother Maura, then? I'm sure she could use some help with the leverets, and she'd appreciate an extra pair of paws to keep them reigned in." Cyril silently congratulated himself on his strategy on deflecting one nuisance toward another.

"Oh, them? Our stripedog doesn't need any help with them this morning. She's got 'em all tied up in another bunny parade."

Cyril paused in the midst of accepting another old barrel hoop from Smallert. "Bunny parade?"

The weasel snickered. "Yeah, that's as good a way o' puttin' it as any, ain't it? An' speakin' o' which, here they come now!"

The two mice followed Smallert's gaze, and beheld what had become a common sight at Redwall on these recent fair spring days: Maura, the Abbey's Badgermum, trundling her ponderous way across the verdant greensward with four toddler hares in tow. And not just in tow, but tethered to her by a long cord tied around her waist, and the waist of each of the leveret quartet in turn. Vanessa had indeed described the procession most succinctly; as Maura ambled along with Faylona, Chevelle, Troyall and Lysander trailing after her in harnessed single-file, they resembled nothing so much as a parade of badger and hares.

"They're so cute before their buckteeth come in," Vanessa cooed as she fully righted herself.

"If they're that irresistible, why don't you go fawn all over them?"

"Why, thank you, Cyril, that's a great idea! I think I will! And just for that ... " Vanessa pounced upon the kneeling mouse, planting a sloppy wet kiss upon his cheek and then, for good measure, blowing heavily into his ear as she rose and skipped off to molest Maura during her babysitting duties.

"Gah!" Cyril spat, pawing at his twitching ear. "I hate it when she does that!"

"Yeah," Smallert said with a smile, "which is why I s'pect she does it."

Cyril wiped at his wet cheek. "I thought maybe that once winter was over and we weren't all cooped up indoors, I'd be able to get away from her a little by losing myself out on the grounds, but she always seems to find me no matter where I go."

A few dozen paces away, all the exercising harebabes had gotten a new diversion into their tiny heads. "Run, Muvva Mawwa!" Faylona called out. Seeking to keep her charges happy, the big badger went into a jog, forcing all the leverets to pick up the pace accordingly, every one of them squeeing and squealing with delight. And there, prancing right alongside them, was Vanessa, giggling as boisterously as anybeast.

"Well," Smallert observed, "that got her outta yer fur, Master Cyril."

"Yeah ... until her brain snaps back, and she sets her sights on me again. Which could be before I finish this sentence, the way she is these days. There's no place inside Redwall where I can escape her, I'm starting to think. Maybe it's time for me to take up a wanderer's life after all, and get away from this Abbey for a few seasons."

"But then you'd hafta give up yer warrior's trainin' with Alex 'n' Monty," Smallert pointed out.

"Oh, I've picked up enough from them that I could fend for myself. I'm a lot better with blade and bow than I was when I left with Broggen last spring," Cyril said, referring to his stoat friend who'd been slain during the strife with the rebel shrew Snoga. "In fact, I know of an empty, quaint badger's cottage deep in the woods two days south of here that might just be calling my name."

"If nobeast else's settled in there by now," Smallert reminded him. "Well-kept abodes wouldn't stay empty fer long, I 'magine, 'specially not in winter. But I wouldn'ta thought you'd wanna go back to that cottage, with all th' unpleasantness wot happened there."

"It's Broggen's final resting place. I'm sure his spirit watches over it, and would welcome me back if I chose to settle there for awhile. And I bet you'd like it too. Why don't you come with me, Smallert? We could both go!"

The weasel shook his head sadly. "Ye're fergettin', Cyr, I still got a death sentence hangin' over my head, fer th' blood I shed in yer home here when I was in Lord Urthblood's army. Prob'ly will, 'til my dyin' day. Can't step outside this Abbey's walls without risk o' that sentence bein' carried out."

Cyril scowled. "I still don't think that's fair. Machus has been dead for seven seasons now. How can a sentence passed by that fox still bind you?"

"Now, Cyril, Machus may've been th' beast to pass that sentence on me, but t'was issued in accordance with Lord Urthblood's rules, which I broke while I was still bound by 'em. Yer brother Cyril may've survived th' wounds I gave 'im, but a rat named Speeg died by my paw, whether I meant 'im to or no, an' that's a crime deservin' th' harshest penalty. If sumpthin' like that'd happened while we was still in th' Northlands before comin' down to Redwall, there'da been no question of allowin' me to live."

"But, it was an accident! They can't hold that over you forever!"

"That's just what they'll do, Cyr lad, an' I don't begrudge 'em fer it t'all. Takin' somebeast's life that you c'n never give back again, that ain't any small matter. Every day I spend here in this Abbey's a reminder o' what I done. Every day I count my blessin's fer bein' able t' live in so splendid a place - an' fer bein' able t' live t'all - but these walls're my prison as well as my sanctuary, an' that's th' plain 'n' simple truth. Tho', a beast couldn't wish fer a finer, happier, friendlier prison, so I got no complaints over my lot in life."

Across the way, the quartet of toddler hares had decided that running wasn't enough for them, and had cast themselves down upon the grass. Maura, knowing this old ploy of theirs well, kept to her jog, in order to forestall their wails of protest were she to stop. Thus, they bounced and rolled and tumbled along the lawn as their halter line yanked them forward, the four leverets laughing up a storm.

Vanessa, too, had thrown herself off her footpaws and now somersaulted alongside the bouncy procession with utter abandon, heedless of the grass stains her dress accumulated.

"Then again," Smallert added with a goofy grin that accentuated his one-eared lopsidedness, "where else in all th' lands would a poor condemned weasel like me rather live?"


	6. Chapter 5

**CHAPTER FIVE**

"So, tell me what I'm looking at."

All the Abbey leaders sat around the big table down in Cavern Hole. Abbot Geoff was there, with Winokur at his side, as had become customary at such gatherings as this, the otter Recorder having on this occasion left his students under the charge of Cyrus and Browder to carry on with the rehearsals for their upcoming pageant. Arlyn was likewise present, giving Metellus the morning off from his healer's lessons. Also included at this council were Alexander and Mina, Skipper Montybank and Colonel Clewiston, representing the squirrel, otter and hare defenders of Redwall respectively, as well as Highwing representing the Sparrafolk of Warbeak Loft. Foremole too held a seat at this conference, and his input would hardly be the least of anybeast's, considering the matter at paw.

Lekkas stood directly across the table from Geoff. Spread out between them, centered upon the tabletop in plain view of everybeast, lay the parchment Lekkas had shared with the Abbot before dinner the previous afternoon. The sturdy mouse addressed Geoff's inquiry with the sweep of his paw over the unfurled plans.

"Friends ... fellow Redwallers ... I now present to you ... Freetown!"

All necks craned forward to more fully take in the schematics; only Foremole, who'd served as architectural consultant to Lekkas along almost every step of this project, remained firmly planted in his seat. After all, he need hardly exert himself now to get a better look at the rendering, since it had come from his own claw.

"A very inspiring name," Geoff said, "and most appropriate for this season as well. But we're not gathered here to gush over a name, however moving or fitting. This is likely our final council on the matter before deciding whether to proceed with this endeavor, which promises to be a formidable one if we do elect to undertake it. You've got your captive audience as you requested, Lekkas, so now's your chance to convince us. Walk us through these plans, if you'd please, and spare no detail."

"Well, it all starts here," Lekkas began, poking down at the largest figure in the rough architectural layout. "The main building is meant to serve as a town hall of sorts, and will be situated just on the other side of the drainage ditch, directly opposite Redwall's main gates. The lower floor, apart from kitchens and storage areas, will mostly be devoted to a single large open chamber, where several score of beasts can congregate for councils and community matters much as we do here in Cavern Hole. We would need such a hall for our own, since we couldn't very well keep coming back to Redwall every time we needed to discuss and debate issues of relevance to all our residents."

"Actually, you _could_," Geoff countered. "I mean, you'd certainly be welcome to do so, if need arose. It's not like Cavern Hole is constantly in use; accommodations could certainly be made. After all, you'll still be Redwallers in spirit, even if you're not physically dwelling within our walls. You'll only be just across the path from us."

"I'm sorry, Abbot, but I just see that as too unwieldy. The whole point of Freetown is to relieve the population pressures on Redwall - which are already great as I stand here now, and will become entirely untenable should we experience any additional influx of freed slaves at all. These aren't just spare dormitories we're discussing here, but an entire new settlement tied to Redwall without being dependent upon the Abbey. We will need our own facilities in order to be as self-sufficient as possible - and that includes our own meeting hall."

"Yes, I can understand that, up to a point," Geoff said. "But I just don't know if I agree with the idea of devoting so much space to a use other than housing, especially in the first structure to go up. After all, you've just acknowledged yourself that extra residences are the primary reason we need Freetown at all."

"The overriding reason, above all others," Lekkas agreed with an emphatic nod. "Which is precisely why this should be the first building constructed, and just as currently designed. Yes, its eventual purpose will be a meeting hall ... but there's not much point in having a town hall until you've got a town to go with it, is there? Which is why the first floor can serve as an open dormitory while the rest of Freetown is built around it. Depending on which beasts move in there and the size of the beds they'll need, we should easily be able to quarter between a dozen and a score of creatures - maybe more, if they're all smaller species like mice and shrews and moles."

Alexander weighed in at this point. "That seems like good thinking. Dual-use space, that can be allocated as need dictates. Very adaptable."

"Log-a-Log and his Guosim would certainly have no problem with such an open sleeping arrangement," Winokur half-joked, "considering how they winter here in Cavern Hole. But many creatures might prefer a bit more privacy than such an open plan allows."

"I doubt it will be anything to worry about," said Lekkas. "For one thing, it will be only a temporary measure, until more proper housing can be constructed. For another, we're doing this for all the former slaves, remember? And as a former slave myself, I can attest to the fact that we were subjected to far greater hardships and indignities than the common sleeping areas we typically shared ... and that's when we weren't chained to rowing benches, where we had to sleep and eat and had not a moment alone for even our most personal needs. This would be paradise for anybeast who ever had to live under such wretched conditions. Besides, would this really be so very different than some of the shared dormitory rooms you have right here at Redwall? A bit larger in scale, but the basic idea is the same."

"I see you've really thought this through," Geoff noted, "although I should hope you would have, when you requested that I convene this gathering. But do go on. I take it there's to be a second story to your town hall building?"

"Correct. And since the kitchens and any other work and storage areas will all be on the ground level or in the cellars, the second floor will be entirely for bedrooms. Proper bedrooms, where married couples and families could live. These current plans call for between six and eight dormitory chambers, although one of those could serve as a nursery for babes and infants, if things, ah, go that way. For bachelor beasts and maids, each chamber should be good for sleeping three or four, again depending on the size of the beasts and how spacious we ultimately decide to make each room."

Colonel Clewiston spoke for the first time. "Almost reminds me o' wot we had at Salamandastron. Not all that dissimilar t'all: private chamber fer married hares, common barracks areas fer the' chaps 'n' chappeses who didn't mind hearin' each other's snores. And as you say, sir, not too different from some o' wot we've already got here at Redwall. 'Course, any of us who doubled up in our mountain home did so outta camaraderie an' companionship, 'cos we had enough old chambers in that place that all hundred o' us never could've filled them all up, no matter how thinly we spread ourselves - Salamandastron's a jolly big bloomin' fortess. Clearly that won't be an option for you lot. 'Fact, I'm wonderin' whether you'll be able t' build all the bally housing you'll need fast enough."

"It won't get built at all if we don't start somewhere," Lekkas returned, "and the longer we delay, the longer it will take to finish. We have to begin somewhere, and Foremole and I agree that this central meeting hall is the logical starting point."

"Yes, but will you ever be finished?" Geoff questioned. "I mean really, truly finished? I can't help but notice that these plans seem to be somewhat open-ended."

"Indeed they are, Abbot. Again, that is precisely the point: an open-ended plan which will allow us to expand as much as we need, for seasons and generations to come, if necessary." Lekkas pointed at his schematics once more. "Once the central town hall is completed, we'll begin an additional six small residences, arranged in a half-circle around the main building with their backs to the Western Plains. These will be mainly single-family abodes, although friends and companions could certainly occupy them too, if we don't have enough married couples to fill them. You'll all notice that those six secondary residences have been rendered by Foremole in the same bold red ink as the town hall, since we'll definitely be building those if this project proceeds. Now, out beyond them you'll see another arc of residences rendered in a more pale color, this row comprised of ten structures, since it's farther out from the center and thus has room for more buildings. Those will be built after the first six homesteads are completed ... and yes, I do think we'll need each and every one of them. In fact, if you look closely you'll note the lightly-stenciled third arc of an additional sixteen residences. With just the creatures we have living at Redwall now - and I'm not even counting the Guosim, who'll be leaving us shortly anyway - we could very easily fill all sixteen houses in the first two rows. If we should receive any large additional waves of freed slaves, as Lord Urthblood has hinted that we very well might, we'll need all thirty-two of these residences ... and maybe more besides."

Geoff nodded. "Yes, very ambitious, as I told you yesterday when you first showed these to me. But I must also echo a sentiment our good Colonel expressed a moment ago, about being able to build so many structures quickly enough, or, more to the point, getting them built at all. I have no doubt that we industrious Redwallers could reopen the quarry, get all the necessary stone mined and measured and cut and ferried across the River Moss and carted to where we need it, and even get your town hall and those first six freestanding residences up by summer's end. But as for the ten beyond those ... and the sixteen beyond that ... does the quarry even still contain enough sandstone for such a large endeavor?"

Montybank found his old friend's concern odd. "Run outta sandstone? Geoff matey, it's a quarry; rock's all it's got to it. How could it run out?"

Geoff crossed his paws, mildly irked at being addressed in such a familiar and informal manner at a council of Abbey leaders, pointedly placing each paw in its opposite sleeve - a consciously Abbotly gesture. "I was thinking, my good Skipper, of Foxguard, and all the sandstone Urthblood excavated for it. Even the largest of quarries does not have a limitless supply. My question was, have those foxes saved us enough sandstone to embark on an equally ambitious project? Because I'm starting to think, listening to Lekkas, that his vision for Freetown might just require nearly as much stone as Foxguard did."

Foremole lifted and waved a digging claw for attention before anybeast else could speak to the Abbot's words. "Burr hurr, oi been in ee quorrie once in moi youngster days, H'Abbot zurr, an' t'were quoite a soight unlike any oi'd ever seen afore. Goes on forever, or just aboawtways. Thurr'll be all ee stoner uz'll need, for foive Freetowns if'n uz wants."

Highwing quickly added, "And I believe I'm the only creature here who has actually visited the quarry in recent seasons, when Andrus and Tolar showed me around it. Our good Foremole is quite correct; its scope is vast, with some underground chambers large enough to hold Redwall's main building with room to spare. I do not suppose that generations of Redwallers working it constantly could deplete its sandstone entirely."

Lekkas smiled, perhaps in triumph. "If any creature's expertise in such areas is to be trusted, I'd say it would be that of the mole and the Sparra who have been there and seen what the rest of us have not. Now obviously, we have no idea what state those foxes left the quarry in, what kind of mess or wreckage or debris we may have to contend with, and we may have to dig down deeper to get at all the stone we'll need, which will of course require more work and more time. But our needs will be met. I am sure of it. I was sure of it even before Foremole and Highwing offered their assessment."

"Then you must have the mandate of destiny within you," Geoff said, trying to sound whimsical rather than sour and unable to tell whether he'd succeeded. He returned his attention to the plans. "But let's move on. Is this a tunnel I see here, going under the road?"

"Yes, it is. I'm afraid I wasn't completely accurate when I said the central hall would be the first part of Freetown constructed. Before a single structure is raised, Foremole will oversee the digging, shoring and lining of a security tunnel linking Freetown and Redwall."

"A security tunnel? Please explain, Lekkas."

"Well, again for the sake of accuracy, it might be more forthcoming to call it what it more properly is: an emergency escape tunnel." Lekkas pointed to the outer fringes of his proposed community. "As I've already covered, one of the great advantages to this open-ended design is that we can continue to expand Freetown for as long and as far as necessary, for as many seasons as we have to. However, this also presents a major drawback as well, since it means we'll never be able to enclose the settlement with any manner of protective wall such as the one which encircles and safeguards Redwall. Aside from all the additional work, materials and complications required for such a barrier, it would also set a definite limit on how much Freetown can grow, which is exactly what we don't want. And you can't very well go to all the time and trouble of building a high wall around the entire town only to knock it down and rebuild it farther out every time you need more residences."

Geoff scratched at the bridge of his snout behind his spectacles. "And so the purpose of this tunnel would be ... ?"

"Evacuation, plain and simple," replied Lekkas. "If we should ever find ourselves besieged and cut off from the Abbey by an enemy, this would still provide us with an avenue into Redwall."

Geoff stared over the tops of his lenses at his fellow mouse. "Yes ... and it would also give vermin invaders one more way into this Abbey that we'd have to guard against. I'm not sure that's very wise."

"Of course that's a valid concern," Lekkas granted, "and we've already taken it into account, at least somewhat. When I first approached Foremole with the idea of incorporating such a tunnel into the designs, we both assumed it would link up with Balla's cellars. However, more thorough investigation revealed that some sections of the Long Patrol warrens run nearly all the way beneath our grounds to the west wall. Tunneling out from that point wouldn't require nearly as much work as connecting the passage to Cavern Hole or the cellars ... and any vermin or enemy who ever tried to breech Redwall's defenses via that route would find themselves emerging into the thick of a nest of the famous, perilous fighting hares of the Long Patrol! I'd not favor their chances of getting much further than that."

"Smack dab on th' button with that jolly assessment, chap," Clewiston readily agreed. "Long as it's not a rotter's sneak attack that catches us snoozin', that is."

"If this Abbey's under siege and on a battle footing, I doubt any invader will catch the Long Patrol off guard, Colonel," Lekkas said with a confident smile. "But there will of course be other safeguards as well, not least of which will be heavy doors at either end of the tunnel - doors which can each be locked from either side. In fact, the one on the Redwall side can be kept locked at all times as a matter of course, and only staffed if trouble breaks out and residents of Freetown might need to be admitted."

"That makes sense all around," Alexander said. "I really can't see it as any kind of major drawback, and certainly not any dire compromise of our security. Where would the other end of the tunnel come out, Lekkas?"

The former slave mouse pointed at the largest structure on the plans. "The town hall, of course. It's centrally located, and the natural fallback position for residents in a time of crisis. Its size will allow many beasts to seek shelter within while we start the evacuation through the tunnel. And it's the closest point to the Abbey, so the tunnel will only have to be dug out to just past the road and the ditch."

"We'll have to make sure the tunnel's dug deep enough to clear that ditch," Winokur noted.

"Oh, it'll be even deeper than that," Lekkas told the otter Recorder. "Remember, if we're going under the wall, we'll need to clear its footings, which Foremole assures me are sunk deep indeed. But this plays into the security angle as well. For one thing, no vermin will be able to exploit this feature if they don't even know about it, and its depth will help keep it hidden. They certainly wouldn't learn about it from Redwall's end, with the terminus there being in the Long Patrol warrens, and they'd not be very likely to come across it inadvertently by digging in the road either. And as for the ditch, where the tunnel will run closest to the surface and be at its most vulnerable - " Lekkas pointed to the schematics once more, " - you'll see that we've included a short stone bridge across the ditch, connecting Freetown to the main path. The design of that span has already been worked out; instead of pylons or an open arch, the sides of the bridge will extend all the way down to the bottom of the ditch, a solid brick face on either side." He ran his gaze around the faces at the table. "And where do you suppose the tunnel will run?"

"Directly under the bridge!" Winokur declared, voicing the conclusion most of his companions had already reached.

Lekkas gave a vigorous nod. "So that a would-be invader would have to demolish and disassemble an entire stone bridge before they could even start to dig down through the ditch bottom to reach the tunnel ... and that's assuming they even knew there was any tunnel there at all."

"You and Foremole have certainly put a great deal of thought and planning into these designs," Geoff admitted. "I'm beginning to suspect there's no question or reservation I could raise that you've not have already anticipated!"

Lekkas couldn't help but grin at this. "I'd like to think so, Abbot. On the matter of safety and security - especially where Redwall is concerned - we tried to build in as many redundancies as possible. For example, not only will the tunnel have heavy dual-locking doors at either end, not only will it be dug deeply enough to make breaching it from above difficult, not only will it be covered by a solid stone bridge at its most vulnerable point, and not only will it lie hidden to the outside world from one end to the other, but an extra flight of steps down from the Long Patrol warrens will be required to connect that end of the tunnel to Redwall's lowest levels. So, in the highly unlikely event that an enemy does gain entry to the tunnel, they'd still have to fight their way through a heavy bolted door and up a steep, narrow flight of stairs ... where they'd find the Long Patrol ready and waiting to greet them! What say you, Colonel? How many of your hares do you deem it would take to hold off a vermin horde if they could only come at you two at a time?"

Clewiston patted at his belly. "Wager I'd be able t' handle th' job all by my jolly lonesome, even with all this extra feast weight I'm carryin' 'round these days. Daresay any hare of my regiment could do th' same, wot? But what if it ain't a vermin horde comin' up through there? Wot if it's Urthblood's minions, an' they got that accursed sleepy vapor stuff with 'em to send up an' send us all off to bally dreamland? Or, worse yet, those yellow burnin' poison vapors that could've been dreamt up on th' other bloomin' side of Hellgates?"

"Colonel!" Mina cried out, unable to contain herself. "Not even you could believe Lord Urthblood would ever use such weapons against Redwall! He has declared himself an ally of this Abbey!"

"He might, if he thought it'd only affect us hares. After all, he's already put us to sleep once ... all in th' blinkin' name o' peace, o' course. Who can say wot he might do if he gets it inta his striped noggin that he knows wot's best for Redwall?"

Lekkas, seeking to rescue his presentation from degenerating into yet another sniping battle between the Gawtrybe Lady and the Long Patrol Colonel, quickly said, "Well, Colonel, if we place the double-locking doors at the top of the stairs, and design it to be solid and tight-fitting, it should effectively serve to keep out any manner of vapors ... "

"It's not Urthblood I'm worried about." Abbot Geoff shot Clewiston a commiserating gaze. "And I don't mean that the way it sounds, Colonel. Of course that badger has done many questionable things, and his true motives remain murky and suspect. But we all know the forces he can command. If that big red brute decides, for whatever reason, that we are his enemy, he would be able to smash through our gates and overwhelm us by sheer force, without having to sneak in through any tunnels. Not to mention that he has his own mole corps who could dig him as many tunnels under our walls as he wants, if he did decide to burrow his way in here. No, Urthblood is an entirely different subject, and a discussion for another day. He does not bear directly upon the matter at paw. Lekkas, if you would please continue ... "

"Well, I was just about finished, Abbot." The strapping mouse swept his paw over the expansive parchment. "There you all have it. If this council declares this project worthy and gives its blessing, we'll start with the tunnel from the Long Patrol quarters leading under the road and the ditch. Where it comes out on the other side of the ditch will be the location of the town hall, and we'll dig out and install the cellars, sub-basement and foundation around the tunnel mouth. And then Freetown will be off and running!"

"Not without its stone it won't," Said Alex. "That's probably what concerns me most about this whole thing. Even if Foremole and Highwing are right and our quarry's not about to run out of stone anytime soon, this will still be a monumental undertaking. It could require seasons to excavate and cut all the stone we'll need for Freetown!"

"I think you're overstating things a bit, Alex," Lekkas responded. "After all, Lord Urthblood mined all the stone he needed for Foxguard in but a single season, and Freetown will not be nearly as ambitious as that fox fortress ... at least not in its early stages. Maybe in a few seasons, if rising population forces continued expansion, it may come to rival Foxguard, but not at the start."

"I don't think I am overstating the matter. Lord Urthblood had twice as many moles working the quarry as we'll have at our disposal, and besides, that badger is himself something of a genius when it comes to architectural concepts. I think Foremole is still a bit agog over those designs for a stairway up to Warbeak Loft that Urthblood threw together in a single day ... "

"Burr hurr, oi serpintly wurr impressed boi 'em, yezzurr," Foremole concurred.

"So," Alexander concluded, "it might take us a long time to get this done. What happens if it gets to be summer's end, and you're still getting the first circle of homes put up? Or your town hall itself?"

Lekkas shrugged. "It takes as long as it takes. I'd rather make sure it's done right, even if it takes longer. And as I said earlier, the longer we wait to start, the longer until it's finished, whenever that will be. But Foremole and I agree Freetown must be wrought of stone. It's simply more defensible, even without any perimeter wall encircling the settlement. There's a reason Redwall's never fallen to an enemy, and that reason lies in the stone all around us now. The same reason, I am sure, that Lord Urthblood chose to make Foxguard of stone rather than wood. Just look at what happened at Doublegate last summer, when Snoga and the searats attacked and reduced that timber stockade to charred ash. And remember how aghast we all were when we learned of the sheer number of trees Urthblood had felled to construct that shrew fort? I know that none of us would wish to see logging on that scale carried out anywhere in nearer Mossflower ... quite apart from the fact that we're simply not set up to handle milling the quantities of lumber that would be required to erect Freetown. It must be sandstone - and that means reopening the quarry and moving all the necessary stone from there to here."

Geoff nodded. "You are most persuasive, as always. Was there anything else you wished to add?"

Lekkas took his seat for the first time since the meeting began. "No, I think I've presented my arguments and reasons as fully as i can. It's up to all of you now; you're the leaders and defenders of Redwall. What say you all? Do we build Freetown?"

"I think we have to," Winokur said, being the first to offer an opinion. "We've known for a long time now that something would need to be done about the overcrowding at Redwall, and this solution addresses all our concerns better than anything else I think we could have come up with."

"Wink's right, awright," Monty agreed. "An' since we riverdogs're like t' be the ones doin' all th' heavy liftin' in this, we'll have as much say in it as anybeast. An' we're willin' t' lend our brawn t' makin' Freetown become a reality, for as long as it takes. We're yores to command, Lekkas matey!"

"Thank you, Skipper ... although I actually suspect it'll be Foremole issuing far more of the orders than I, since he and his moles are the ones who'll be in charge of measuring and cutting all the stone."

"Boi okey, oi 'spect that'll be ee case, zurrs. Uz molers'll troi not t' be too 'ard on yurr watterdoggies, Maister Monty, hurr hurr hurr!"

"Although," Geoff interjected, "some of your mole crew will obviously have to stay behind at the Abbey, for any masonry or tinkering needs that arise."

"And let's not forget," Lekkas reminded everybeast, "Log-a-Log has agreed to lend his Guosim to this cause, at least for the first part of spring before they begin their wanderings for the warmer months. So you'll have plenty of muscle to help you shift and move all that sandstone, Monty!"

Alex spoke next. "I really can't argue with anything that anybeast else here has said. This sounds to me like a logical and well thought out answer to the problem of our growing population. I might still have some doubts over how quickly and practically we'll be able to finish Freetown, but I'm more than happy to give you the chance to prove me wrong. You have my support on this, Lekkas."

"An' mine too, I s'pose," Clewiston added with a resigned sigh. "Still not too keen on havin' a tunnel comin' up into our bloomin' bedroom spaces, but we'll cope with that if we jolly well have to. Otherwise, this all sounds solid 'n' shipshape t' me - at the risk of soundin' like a waterdog m'self."

Geoff placed his paws on the table before him. "Then it sounds like we're all - "

"Excuse me," Lady Mina cut in, "but aren't we overlooking something?"

"If you feel we have neglected any angle or detail in this deliberation, My Lady, by all means speak up."

"We have not sought Lord Urthblood's counsel or consent on this matter. I feel it would be unwise to proceed until we do so."

Many at the table stared at the squirrel agape that she should voice such an idea; a few sputtered but were unable to find the words to respond. It was Lekkas who first found his voice.

"My Lady, we all appreciate the loyalty with which you have served Urthblood in the past, and the high esteem in which you continue to hold him. But this is a Redwall matter, and not his concern."

"His concern is the safety and security of all the lands," Mina swiftly countered. "When he came down to Mossflower from the Northlands seven seasons ago, he made Redwall his first stop and his top priority, recognizing the strategic and tactical importance of this Abbey. He offered his open-ended allegiance to Redwall, and made many suggestions to improve security here - suggestions we continue to follow to this day, even while some among us question his motives, and others go so far as to condemn him for his every move. And hearing what I have heard here, I must wonder whether he would permit such an endeavor."

"Permit it?" Lekkas spat. "We don't need that badger's permission to build what we need to address our own needs!"

"And I don't seem to remember Lord Urthblood consulting _us_ before going ahead with Foxguard," Geoff added primly, "even though that fortress lies practically on our doorstep."

"The other side of the River Moss is hardly our doorstep," Mina retorted, showing no signs of backing down. "And Foxguard was a security matter, requiring no consultation with anybeast if Lord Urthblood deemed it necessary to maintain the stability of Mossflower. A security matter, Abbot ... as I believe this may be as well."

"Security matter or not, even you cannot deny he had his foxes actively deceive us as to Foxguard's true shape and scale, until it would be too late for us to stop it."

"Why would you have wanted to stop it, Abbot? We just had Tolar and his brigade here for Nameday, and from what I remember, they were all welcomed and regarded as friends and allies. Building Foxguard was no different from when Lord Urthblood came here to improve your own defenses."

While several pairs of eyebrows went up at this assessment, Colonel Clewiston nearly exploded. "Pish 'n' tosh, hornswoggle 'n' bally balderdash! Only reason His Bloodiness made this fine place his first stop down from th' Northlands was so he could use Redwall as one big blinkin' bloomin' batch o' bait t' lure a truly upstandin' Badger Lord out of Salamandastron an' into a trap. An' that devil's all but admitted, openly an' freely, that that's exactly wot he did an' meant to do, so don't you dare try 'n' paint it any other way! Marm!"

Mina regarded Clewiston coolly. "You remind me once again why we never share adjacent seats at these councils, Colonel."

Lekkas, having regained some of his composure, addressed Mina. "My Lady, perhaps you could be more specific with your ... security concerns? I have thoroughly covered all the safeguards the tunnel would incorporate, and I truly believe it would pose - "

She waved a dismissive paw as she cut him off. "Forget about the tunnel. This isn't even about that. Or about the lack of an outer protective wall, although that's part of it. Right now you envision Freetown as an ever-expanding extension of Redwall, a settlement which will keep growing for as long as it needs to. Okay, fine. But the bigger it grows, the farther from the escape tunnel the outermost residences will be. So let us say that sometime, several seasons hence, a vermin horde sweeps in and overruns Freetown, while the rest of us sit safe and secure behind these walls. I will grant you the tremendously generous benefit of the doubt and posit that only one or two families are captured before the rest of you succeed in escaping through your tunnel into Redwall. What happens when those families are staked out in the Western Plains within sight of our battlements and threatened with torture and slow, cruel death unless we throw open our gates? What will you do then? Because it will happen, mark my words. I have fought against vermin hordes - I suspect the Colonel and I may well be the only beasts at this table who can make such a claim - and I know how they work. This is exactly what they would do. So I ask you, when that day comes - what will you do?"

"Why ... that's ... you're being ridiculous!" Lekkas fairly stammered. "Of course we would not ask Redwall to open its gates under such circumstances! Freetown will be on its own in that regard, and we would never make any demand on this Abbey which might jeopardize it. Indeed, in such a case, we would insist that Redwall's gates remain firmly shut and locked, no matter what those barbarians threatened!"

"That's all well and good ... except that you are not the one who decides when Redwall's gates are opened or closed." Mina turned her gaze on Geoff. "What say you, Abbot? Such a decision would fall upon your shoulders and nobeast else's. Is Freetown to be considered a part of this Abbey, and its residents Redwallers? If so, we could not sit by and watch them be slaughtered. And if not, then what exactly would their standing be? Neighbors, friends, allies? What exactly would be the relationship between Redwall and Freetown, and to what degree would we be bound to aid them in times of strife?"

"Ah, um, er ... well, naturally, I would always have to think of Redwall first, of course ... "

"A safe answer which answers nothing. What would you _do_, Abbot?"

"He already told you," Lekkas said, bristling at Mina's needling tone toward Geoff. "He would think of Redwall first. He would not open the gates."

"I did not hear him say that - and I was talking to him, not you. Please do not presume to speak for our Abbot."

"You're a flippin' fine one t' be callin' out other beasts on their lack o' manners," Clewiston chastised the Gawtrybe squirrel. "Then again, much as it pains me t' admit it, this treewalloper's got a bally point. Would Freetown compromise Redwall's safety, if such a rotten state of affairs came to pass?"

Mina fixed Geoff with an unwavering, unequivocal stare. "You must speak to this concern, Abbot, here and now. You must do so firmly, clearly and definitely, with no ambiguity whatsoever. What will you do if you see a family of woodlanders held for ransom against Redwall? What if it is two families, or three? What if half of Freetown is being held under the blade?"

Her husband entered the debate then, sparing Geoff from the immediate answer for which he was being pressed. "You're forgetting one thing, Mina. Redwall's squirrel archers may not be quite in the same class as the Gawtrybe, but we're still good enough for laying low any vermin who'd dare to threaten our friends and neighbors ... and we could do so right from the safety of our walltop."

"No doubt you could. But as your shafts found the vermin, their blades would be laying open the throats and slipping between the ribs of their hostages. It would be a bloodbath - the very thing they would threaten us with in the first place."

"I dunno, Mina ma'am," said Montybank. "Seems t' me, 'tween us otters 'n' Alex's squirrels an' th' Long Patrol 'sides, we got enuff force o' arms t' take care o' any ragtag band o' bandits who gets it in mind t' stir up a fuss."

"I am not talking about a small band," said Mina, "but a horde large enough to completely overrun Freetown. An enemy force of a hundred, or two hundred, or more - one which would truly test Redwall's battle-readiness."

Winokur raised a paw. "Excuse me, Mina, but just where would this hypothetical horde come from? Lord Urthblood is putting all the vermin of the lands under his flag. In fact, isn't his entire purpose in doing so to eliminate the very threat you're talking about?"

"A distant dream, perhaps, but not the reality we face today, or the world we might know for many seasons. Even in the Northlands, where Lord Urthblood labored for twenty seasons to tame the forests and mountains, some vermin elements remain outside his control. Who can say whether the Accord with Tratton will hold, or if some greater threat lurks in the wilder regions of Mossflower and the territories beyond? Lord Urthblood's prophecy warns of a crisis - a crisis which may yet find us. If that day arrives, who among us will want to be outside these walls then?"

She turned her gaze upon Geoff yet again. "What would you do if that day comes and Freetown falls, Abbot? Will you stand firm to safeguard this Abbey, no matter what horrors are visited upon the freed slaves across the road, within sight of our walltop?"

"I ... I would not be able to say, now. There are too many variables. It would all depend upon the exact circumstances, and what options lay open to us at that time. Who would these supposed attackers be, how heavily armed, what tactics and strategies would they use, would we have our full strength of defenders, how many of the Freetown beasts would be able to escape into Redwall before we had to seal off the tunnel ... "

"All immaterial. We can assume that if Freetown falls, there will be hostages, and those hostages will be used against us. We can assume that the ultimate aim of any such horde will be nothing less than the total and complete conquest of Redwall. Lord Urthblood will not see Redwall fall. I will not see Redwall fall. And I suspect no creature at this table would see Redwall fall either. So I must ask you again, Abbot: Will you stand firm to keep this Abbey safe, even if it means witnessing a slaughter of our allies from our battlements?"

Before Geoff could speak to further address Mina's near-harangue, Lekkas addressed him as well. "Abbot, you must do this. You must assure us now - you must swear, you must vow - that you will never allow Freetown to be held as a hostage which would endanger Redwall, no matter what happens outside your walls. I have in fact discussed this aspect of Freetown's design with Clovis and Wharff and Kurdyla and Granholm and some of the other former slaves, and we understand that we will be vulnerable to outside forces to a degree Redwall is not. We accept this, and are willing to live with the risk ... but not if it might threaten this Abbey as well. The risk we would gladly take on for ourselves is not one we would ask others to share; it is our burden alone. You must promise this, Abbot."

For long moments Geoff and Lekkas sat with gazes locked, the former slave mouse as urgently implacable as always, the Abbot thinking many things in his eyes. When at last that locked gaze was broken, it was Geoff whose gaze fell to his folded paws upon the table before him.

"I'm sorry, Lekkas, but I cannot do as you ask. Nobeast can see the future - at least nobeast here among us - so we cannot know with certainty what events may transpire, or precisely how circumstances may unfold. We have many stout defenders here, as you can see, with very good heads on their shoulders. That will give us many options to meet any crisis that unfolds. Of course, as I have already stated, I will always do what is in Redwall's best interests, and that certainly entails not throwing our gates wide willy nilly to accommodate a conquering horde. But neither will I lock myself into refusing a course of action that limits our options, paint myself into a corner or make a promise against future events we cannot guess. Decisions such as these can only be made when we know what we are facing, when the clear shape of the threat stands sharply defined before us and our recourse can be formulated accordingly. That is my answer, as Abbot of Redwall, and you must be satisfied with it."

"So ... if residents of Freetown were ever to be captured and threatened with harm unless Redwall's gates are opened to their captors, you would actually consider doing such a thing? Giving into their demands?"

"Most probably not. Almost certainly not, in fact. But I am not standing upon our walltop at this moment, gazing upon youngsters and oldbeasts staked out on display with vermin swords at their throats, spears at their ribs or hot brands over their eyes. I will not bind my paws here and now by swearing to a promise I do not know whether I will be able to keep there and then. A promise from Redwall's Abbot is not a thing lightly given, and if there is a chance, however remote, that I might have to break it, I would just as soon not give it."

"Abbot," Mina said levelly, "if you ever seriously entertained the notion of opening Redwall's gates to an enemy horde, I would, respectfully, bonk you over the head."

Geoff allowed himself a smirk at the squirrel Lady's temerity. "It might just come to that, and would neatly take the responsibility of so dire a decision out of my paws. But that does not change the fact that I am still not comfortable issuing the pledge you seek here at this council. I'm sorry, Lekkas."

Mina sat back in her chair, her posture resolute. "Without that promise, Abbot, I cannot vote for Freetown to proceed."

"Yes, I would have guessed that would be your position, Lady." Geoff glanced around the table. "But I suspect you will be in the minority. Lekkas should still have more than enough votes here to - "

"There's no need for a vote," Lekkas interrupted, standing and rolling up the parchment. "Mina is not the only one who needed to hear that promise from you, Abbot. I will not be party to anything that could endanger Redwall, however unlikely the possibility. Freetown will not be built."

A stunned silence fell over Cavern Hole as Lekkas tucked the overlarge scroll under his arm and strode from the chamber. And as he climbed the short flight of stairs up to Great Hall, everybeast could clearly see that the stalwart mouse's wide shoulders, usually squared in confident assurance, now slumped in resigned defeat.


End file.
